Philip Blumel: No third term for President Trump. Hi, I’m Philip Blumel. Welcome to No Uncertain Terms, the official podcast of the Term Limits movement. This is episode 274, published on November 11, 2025.
Stacey Selleck: Your sanctuary from partisan politics.
Philip Blumel: Well, it’s official, after dropping several hints to the contrary and permitting both his supporters and detractors to go crazy on social media for months, President Trump told reporters on Air Force One en route to South Korea on October 29th that he did not intend to run for a third term. Let’s hear it from the horse’s mouth.
President Trump: I have my highest poll numbers that I’ve ever had, and based on what I read, I guess I’m not allowed to run. So we’ll see what happens.
Speaker 4: Joe said you are trolling when you talk about a third term.
President Trump: I don’t think he said that. I don’t think he’d use that term. But it’s a very interesting thing. I have the best numbers for any president in many years, any president. And I would say that if you read it, it’s pretty clear I’m not allowed to run. Stupid, I mean, stupid. But we have a lot of great people.
Philip Blumel: We would have been going crazy also if we fell for the president’s trolling, believe me. But the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution is simple. It’s clear as day and is in no danger of being repealed. Now, true, there was an at least apparent effort to repeal it this year. U.S. Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee actually introduced a bill in January to amend the Constitution to permit a third term for the president. It got a lot of press, but it didn’t get any cosponsors, not one. It was just for show.
Speaker 5: This is a public service announcement.
Philip Blumel: The new bipartisan partnership of former Democratic U.S. Representative David Trone of Maryland and Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is directing attention to U.S. Term Limits and the Term Limits Convention project. U.S. Term Limits CEO Nick Tomboulides appeared on Scripps Television last week to tell the story.
Stephanie : And we are 23 days now into the government shutdown, and it doesn’t look like it’s ending anytime soon. But we do have at least some bipartisan agreement on how to potentially bring compromise back to Congress. It comes from Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis and former Representative David Trone, a Democrat from Maryland. The two teamed up for a guest essay in the New York Times calling for term limits to help avoid future government shutdowns. Joining me to talk about this is the CEO of U.S. Term Limits, Nick. I want to thank you so much for joining us this morning. And first, I’ll just say, what exactly is your group lobbying for? What type of term limits do you want to see in Congress?
Nick Tomboulides: Thank you, Stephanie. Great to be here. We are calling for a three-term limit in the House and a two-term limit in the Senate. We think that would be striking the right balance in terms of getting some experience while also allowing for a regular inflow of new faces, new ideas in Washington, D.C. The one thing that we know is the system is broken. We’ve got a Congress that’s predominated by career politicians, many of whom have been in office for decades, 20, 30 years, and they can’t even do their most basic responsibilities. They can’t even pass a budget to keep the government open. I mean, it’s like having a lifeguard who can’t swim. If Congress can’t keep the government open, what are they good for? So we need new people, we need new ideas, we need term limits. We need members of Congress who can change the system before it changes them.
Stephanie : So, you know, six years in the House, 12 years in the Senate, but is that long enough? I went through our current Senate, for example. A two-term limit would mean 46 sitting senators, almost half of the Senate, wouldn’t be in office anymore. Is two terms enough for the Senate, for example?
Nick Tomboulides: I think so. I’ll quote what Ronald Reagan said: “The only experience you get in politics is how to be political.” And I think we’re seeing that play out at a national stage right now. We have people in Washington for decades and decades. They just become more and more entrenched. They don’t become better at their jobs. They don’t become better at reflecting the people’s will in government. They start falling in bed with the lobbyists and the special interests. We need to change it. It’s time for new ideas and new perspectives, people who can actually go there and get the job done.
Stephanie : So part of the argument for term limits focuses on the money in politics and the fundraising advantage that some incumbents have. I want to read a portion of that essay from DeSantis and Trone. It said, “Greater turnover would mean more politicians invested in interests of their constituents and the nation as a whole over those of entrenched and influential advocacy groups. It would go a long way toward restoring trust in our political institutions and reducing the influence of money in our elections.” Now, that’s certainly an argument I have heard before any time I’ve asked about trying to get more compromise back in Congress. People say get the money out of politics. But if the money’s not flowing to individuals, wouldn’t it still flow into campaigns or parties, maybe at the state or the national level, instead of going to an individual incumbent?
Nick Tomboulides: So what we see now is that there is a very corrosive relationship between money and incumbency. The special interests, the PACs, the lobbyists, they give about $10 to incumbents for every $1 they give to challengers. It makes it almost impossible for outsiders to compete and get elected to Congress. But when you have an open seat race, it is much more equalized, it is much more balanced. What you see is when a seat is open, people from all walks of life have a chance to run. And that is what term limits would deliver on a regular basis. Term limits is just the basic idea that we want open seats, we want new blood, we want new ideas. And by the way, term limits itself is not a new idea. We’ve done it for the president since the 1950s. A president can’t serve more than two terms. We do it for 36 governors. We do it for tons of state legislators, mayors, and other local positions. If it’s good enough for all of these positions, if it’s good enough for the leader of the free world, why wouldn’t it be good enough for Congress?
Stephanie : You know, Congress, not somewhere that we see a lot of compromise. I certainly think the current government shutdown is a prime example of the two parties not really being able to try to work with each other. So how exactly do you think term limits, effectively forcing this turnover in Congress, how would that help reduce the partisan disagreements that can sometimes bring government literally right now to a halt?
Nick Tomboulides: Well, I think it would, because right now a member of Congress’s first priority is to get reelected. They’re focused more on keeping power, keeping their jobs, rather than doing their jobs. And we see that reflected in how they spend their time. So, for example, there was a report from CBS several years ago which showed that a member of Congress spends about five hours a day, on average, fundraising for their next reelection campaign. They leave Capitol Hill, they go down the street, they get on the phone, and they just dial for dollars all day rather than reading the bills, rather than meeting with their constituents and doing the real research that is required to be a Congressmember. If you had term limits, the focus wouldn’t be on just keeping your job relentlessly because you have a fixed timeline, you have an urgency, you have a purpose that you bring to the job. That doesn’t exist with all these cynical career politicians. So that is our goal. We want people who get elected for the right reasons, who want to change the system before it changes them.
Stephanie : Okay, so talk to me about how this could happen. What would it take to institute term limits in Congress? What type of processes, what type of laws would need to happen in order to make this a reality?
Nick Tomboulides: Sure. Well, the Supreme Court has said it needs to be a constitutional amendment. There are only two ways to do that. One is a two-thirds vote in Congress to propose it. The other is two-thirds of states calling for a convention to propose an amendment. When you go through Congress, the problem with term limits is it cuts so strongly against the self-interests of the Congressmen. It’s like asking chickens to vote for Colonel Sanders. It’s not realistic. Congress is not going to do it without immense external pressure. But the way you create that pressure is by going to the state legislatures and having them make calls for a term limits convention.
Nick Tomboulides: We’ve got 12 states on board right now, and this is going to be the focus of Governor DeSantis and former Congressman Trone. They’re going to go into the states. They are basically going to be serving as the megaphone for the people to carry this message that 87% of Americans believe in. 87% of us want term limits. They’re going to carry that to the national stage. They’re going to carry it to the state legislatures because if more and more states sign up, they will put pressure on Congress to propose the amendment. Congress will see the writing on the wall, and they’ll have no choice but to propose it. But in order to get Congress in that position, we have to pass more states. So that will be the focus of this campaign.
Stephanie : Certainly would be a big change to how Congress operates right now, to how we all go to the ballot at least every two years for federal elections. Nick Tomboulides, CEO of U.S. Term Limits, thanks so much for sharing some of your insight this morning. And we will have much more Scripps News after this break.
Nick Tomboulides: Thanks, Stephanie. Appreciate it.
Philip Blumel: Speaking of Representative David Trone, the co-founder and co-owner of Total Wine and More is taking his show on the road. The former Democratic Congressmember is making a presentation and leading a panel discussion on December 4th at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. Trone will be discussing how term limits will reinvigorate American democracy and, importantly, the strategy for achieving them. Another highlight of the event will be Pennsylvania State Representative Jared Solomon, the chief sponsor of the Term Limits Convention resolution bill in the Pennsylvania House. The bill is HCR111, and it’s scheduled for its first committee hearing shortly. If Pennsylvania passes the Term Limits Convention bill calling for an Article 5 convention limited to the subject of congressional term limits, it will be the 13th state to do so. Representative Solomon was interviewed recently by U.S. Term Limits Northern Regional Director Aaron Duquette. Take a listen.
Aaron Dukette: Longtime Maine Senator Susan Collins has a new challenger. The state’s Governor Janet Mills is seeking the Democratic nomination at the age of 77. As WBZ’s political analyst John Keller shows us, Mills is trying to get ahead of questions about her age with a promise, a promise that voters have heard before.
John Keller: Mills tells the Boston Globe she will only serve one six-year term, a pledge that inserts her into the debate over whether or not 79-year-old Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey should be seeking another term next year, itself an offshoot of fallout from octogenarian Joe Biden’s ill-fated reelection bid. If Mills wins the nomination against five-term incumbent Collins, who signed this pledge to serve just two terms when she was first elected in 1996.
Speaker 10: There’s a lot of good people out there that can step up and take a turn and bring some fresh perspectives, fresh ideas to modern 2023 problems and not bringing a 1985 mindset to them.
Philip Blumel: Also joining Trone and Solomon on stage in Philadelphia on December 4th are Representatives Regina Young and Representative Abigail Salisbury, also former State Representative and U.S. Term Limits Senior Advisor Daniel Hernandez, and former State Senator Andrew Dinnaman, who will be emceeing the event. Events by invitation only. But if you’re a listener of No Uncertain Terms, you are part of the Term Limits movement inner circle. If you’d like to attend, contact me and let’s talk about it. You can reach me at pblumel@termlimits.com. P-B-L-U-M-E-L, pblumel@termlimits.com. Also worth mentioning that David Trone and Ron DeSantis will appear together on a segment of Special Report with Bret Baier on Fox News. You can catch that interview at 6:00 p.m. on November 17th. Next, another sad tale from the U.S. Congress where the powers of incumbency are so great that aged members can lose their minds and still can’t lose elections. The latest humiliation regards the U.S. Representative of Washington, D.C., an elected but non-voting member of the U.S. Congress, 88-year-old Eleanor Holmes Norton. Here’s the story from NBC News 4 Washington.
NBC News 4: That breaking news you are seeing first on News 4. D.C. Police confirming they’re investigating a case of credit card fraud against Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton. Thank you for joining us for News 4. I’m Erica Gonzalez. Anyang has the evening off. An internal police report obtained by News 4 describes Norton as having dementia. The report details how suspects were able to enter her home yesterday and access her credit card before a person the report described as a caretaker put a stop to it. News 4’s Mark Segraves broke that story on social media. Mark has a response tonight from Norton’s office and the details that you’ll see only on 4.
Mark Segraves: According to two separate police reports, officers were called to Eleanor Holmes Norton’s home just blocks from the U.S. Capitol yesterday afternoon. Both reports detail how an employee of Norton’s reported the Congresswoman had been the victim of credit card fraud. The public report identifies the person who called police as Jacqueline Pelt. Pelt is a longtime friend and campaign manager for Norton. News 4 obtained a more detailed internal report written by the First District Watch Commander, who was one of the officers who responded to the incident. According to that internal report, the person reporting the crime is only identified as Norton’s caretaker/power of attorney. The internal report says the caretaker was not at the home but noticed through a security camera that a cleaning crew was in the Congresswoman’s home and asked them to leave.
Mark Segraves: The internal report says the caretaker then went to Norton’s home and flagged down a D.C. Police officer. A spokesperson for Norton confirms Pelt was the person who notified police but tells News 4 she’s not Norton’s caretaker. The spokesperson would not say whether Pelt has power of attorney for Norton as stated in the internal police report. The internal report says the suspects charged more than $4,000 on Norton’s credit card for work they did not perform. The internal report goes on to say, “Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton of D.C., 88 years old, black woman, suffers early stages of dementia.” A spokesperson for Norton issued this statement to News 4: “The medical diagnosis included in the police report was based on an assumption the reporting officer was unqualified to make.
Mark Segraves: Furthermore, Congresswoman Norton does not have a caretaker. A longtime employee and friend serves as the house manager, residing at a separate address.” Norton’s spokesperson declined to say whether Norton has had any diagnosis, telling News 4 her office does not comment on the Congresswoman’s health. The internal police report goes on to say the suspects had tried two other times in the past two months to solicit services at Norton’s home but were unsuccessful, and that Norton’s credit card and driver’s license number potentially may have been compromised. A spokesperson for the D.C. Police Department confirms there is an open investigation into the fraud claim involving Norton’s credit card in the district. Mark Segraves, News 4.
NBC News 4: And the statement from Norton’s office went on to say, quote, “The Congresswoman is safe, and the fraudulent charges have been reported to the police and her bank. She thanks MPD and Capitol Police for their quick response. There will be no further comment, ” end quote.
Philip Blumel: Is it hyperbole to call this exploitation of the elderly? I don’t think so. In other fields, those who care about the aged quietly assist them from the stage with their dignity intact. This is their colleagues and their family and their friends and, of course, themselves, if they recognize what’s happening to them. In congressional politics, on the other hand, the incentives are perverse. Special interests and political hangers-on prop up aged politicians because they know they can rely on them to win elections until they mumble, stumble, and fall down. We need term limits for the U.S. Congress, not just for the American people, but sometimes even for the politicians themselves. Next, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced last week that she would not run for reelection. The 83-year-old is calling it quits after 38 years in the U.S. Congress representing the San Francisco area. She was first elected in 1987. Pelosi was often used as a poster child for term limits by her Republican detractors, much as the 81-year-old Senator Mitch McConnell has been a foil for Democrats.
Philip Blumel: Both have served in leadership for a generation, an impossibility in term-limited legislatures. In these positions, unbeatable incumbents in leadership like these dig their heels in and block progress for decades, keeping outdated conflicts alive and blocking younger members from attaining positions of power and influence. Both of these two actively opposed congressional term limits during their reigns. Meanwhile, they get older and less vital, even as their positions as powerful incumbents make it nearly impossible to remove them. It is as if molasses or glue has been dumped into the machinery of government.
Philip Blumel: Now, while Pelosi was not suffering from dementia, she naturally suffered from the normal aspects of aging, including verbal slips, memory lapses, and stumbles. The most striking of these was her fall down a set of marble stairs at the Grand Ducal Palace in Luxembourg at a congressional event commemorating the Battle of the Bulge. Well, we all age, and Nancy Pelosi, no matter what you think of her politics, should not be criticized for getting old. I bring this up only to shine light on the negative synergy of one, entrenched incumbency, in conjunction with two, a seniority-based system. We deserve better.
Philip Blumel: Pelosi isn’t the only prominent Democrat who announced she’s not seeking reelection. Term limit supporters will be sorry to hear that U.S. Representative Jared Golden of Maine is also leaving office. The 41-year-old Democrat, a former U.S. Marine, wrote in a Bangor Daily News op-ed in October that, quote, “Now is the right time to step away from elected office.” Representative Golden had served for about four years in the Maine Legislature and will have served six years in the U.S. House when he finishes his current term. Representative Golden is a signer of the U.S. Term Limits pledge and also a cosponsor of the Congressional Term Limits Amendment currently introduced in the U.S. House. Here’s Representative Golden three years ago at the Maine Democratic Convention talking about his sponsorship of the U.S. Term Limits Amendment bill.
Rep. Jared Golden: If it’s not already clear, I have no love for Washington or the way the politics is done, and if I lose this fall, I’ll accept it and walk away with my head held high and be just fine. As it is, I believe in term limits, and I’ve cosponsored a bill to put them in place.
Philip Blumel: Thank you, Representative Golden, for all your help as you took your turn at the oars like a good citizen does. We respect your decision not to make Congress your career. Good luck in all your future endeavors.
Stacey Selleck: Like the show? You can help by subscribing and leaving a five-star review on both Apple and Spotify. It’s free.
Philip Blumel: Thanks for joining us for another episode of No Uncertain Terms. The Term Limits Convention bills are moving through the state legislatures. This could be a breakthrough year for the Term Limits movement. To check on the status of the Term Limits Convention resolution in your state, go to termlimits.com/takeaction. There you will see if it has been introduced and where it stands in the commission process on its way to the final floor vote. If there’s action to take, you’ll see a Take Action button by your state. Click it. This will give you the opportunity to send a message to the most relevant legislators, urging them to support the legislation. They have to know you are watching. That’s termlimits.com/takeaction. If your state has already passed the Term Limits Convention resolution or the bill’s not been introduced in your state, you can still help. Please consider making a contribution to U.S. Term Limits. It is our aim to hit the reset button on the U.S. Congress, and you can help. Go to termlimits.com/donate, termlimits.com/donate. Thanks. We’ll be back next week.
Stacey Selleck: Find us on most social media @USTermLimits. Like us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and now LinkedIn.