Can a felon run for president?
Yes. The Constitution lists only three eligibility requirements - age, citizenship, and residency. A criminal conviction does not constitutionally bar someone from running for or serving as president.
The Constitution sets exactly three requirements to be president: natural-born citizenship, age 35 or older, and 14 years of U.S. residency. Criminal conviction is not among them. No constitutional amendment has added conviction as a bar to the presidency.
Some offices - federal judgeships, for example - carry disqualification for certain offenses, but the presidency does not. Congress has debated proposals to add such a bar, but none have been enacted.
The 14th Amendment, Section 3 - the Disqualification Clause - bars from office persons who engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the United States after having sworn an oath to support the Constitution. Whether and how that clause applies to specific candidates is a matter of ongoing legal and political debate.
A sitting president who commits a crime can be impeached and removed by Congress; if the Senate also votes to disqualify the person from future office, that vote would bar them. But a conviction in the regular criminal courts alone does not trigger automatic removal or disqualification from the presidency.
Related questions
Can a person run for president while imprisoned?
Can states bar felons from appearing on their ballots?
Related explainers
To be eligible, a person must be a natural-born U.S. citizen, at least 35 years old, and have lived in the U.S. for at least 14 years.
No. The 22nd Amendment bars anyone from being elected president more than twice. Having won in 2016 and 2024, Trump is constitutionally ineligible to be elected president again in 2028.
The 22nd Amendment limits the president to two elected terms. Ratified in 1951, it bars any person from being elected president more than twice.