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Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris met face to face on the debate stage on Tuesday night and it went about as expected. Trump lambasted his rival and made outrageous claims about immigrants eating cats and babies being executed after they were born.
Harris, for her part, painted Trump as a bully, a laughingstock, and a threat to democracy, claiming that Trump would “terminate” the Constitution of the United States if he was elected. Would he? The answer requires more context than a simple yes or no.
To get to the origin of the Constitution termination talk, we need to travel back to the quaint era of 2022, back when the former President was wailing 24/7 about a stolen election. It was December 3 and Trump had just announced he was going to run for president again.
He shared a post on his social media site Truth Social saying there was a “revelation” of “MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION” between the “DNC,” democrats and “Big Tech Companies,” and because of that he lost the election.
In usual Trump style, he provided no context for those remarks. Despite the lack of factual backing, he claimed that because of this supposed collusion, the results of the election should be thrown out and either he should be declared the winner, or there should be a new election. Then he continued with the Constitution talk:
“A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution. Our great ‘Founder’ did not want, and would not condone, False & Fraudulent Elections!”
We should probably point out that there is no “Founder” of this country, there are founders, plural. Regardless, this caused quite the stir. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries called the statement weird and over-the-top and said:
“Republicans are going to have to work out their issues with the former president and decide whether they’re going to break from him and return to some semblance of reasonableness or continue to lean in to the extremism, not just of Trump, but Trumpism.”
Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who sits on the House Intelligence Committee, also lashed out against Trump, saying he disagreed with the statement “vehemently,” going so far as to condemn the remarks.
Then newly elected representative Mike Lawler, from New York, said the Constitution was “set for a reason,” to “protect the rights of every American.” He said it was time for Trump to stop looking to the past and whining about “prior elections.”
“I think the former president would be well-advised to focus on the future, if he is going to run for president again.” President Joe Biden’s administration also came out swinging, saying that “You cannot only love America when you win” and that the Constitution is a “sacrosanct document that for over 200 years has guaranteed that freedom and the rule of law prevail in our great country.”
That’s a lot of heat, even for a former president like Trump, so he tried to walk it back on December 5, contradicting himself in his usual manner.
“The Fake News is actually trying to convince the American People that I said I wanted to ‘terminate’ the Constitution. This is simply more DISINFORMATION & LIES,” he wrote. What he really meant to say, he explained, was that when there’s “MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION” then “steps must be immediately taken to RIGHT THE WRONG.” He added that “only FOOLS” would disagree with that sentiment and accept a stolen election.
The walking back did not do enough to quell the fire, because it was brought up with vigor during the GOP primary debate in Aug. 2023 by Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
“Donald Trump said it is okay to suspend the Constitution. The vote you take is to preserve, protect and defend, not suspend. I will always stand up for our Constitution regardless of the political pressure.”
The main takeaway here is that he, whether intentionally or not, softened Trump’s words about the issue. Trump called for the termination, not suspension, of the Constitution.
This brings us back to the most recent debate. Harris hammered Trump on the issue: “Understand this is someone who has openly said he would terminate, I’m quoting, He would ‘terminate’ the Constitution of the United States. He would weaponize the Department of Justice against his political enemies.”
While it does seem doubtful that Trump would even have the authority, mechanisms or desire to do away with the Constitution, we know at the very least he threatened to do so with his own words.