So, if the president dies, the procedure is that the vice president would then become president for the remainder of the term.
But what would happen if some extremist group somehow kidnapped the president (any sitting president, so this isn’t targeted towards trump specifically, although I guess for the next 4 years it would be).
Like, lets say every Monday at noon, this extremist group did a live stream somehow, showing that the president is still alive, still coherent, but ballgagged so they can’t just blurt out where they are.
And lets say that nobody is able to figure out where they’re broadcasting from. For years.
Would that president remain president? Or would they treat them as dead, even though they’re shown to be alive, and vice president becomes president for the remainder of the term?
The same thing as if he were sick or otherwise “incapacitated.” Being locked up by kidnappers incapacitates you. The VP would step up. However impractical terms the VP would absolutely downplay this, always trying to give the impression that the president will be rescued any minute now and everything will go back to normal.