Donald Trump on Monday repeated his weekend remarks to Christian summit attendees that they would never need to vote again if he returns to the presidency in November.

But, after being asked repeatedly on Fox News to clarify what he meant, the Republican former president denied threatening to permanently stay in office beyond his second – and constitutionally mandated final – four-year term.

During the initial remarks made on Friday, which caused outrage and alarm among his critics, Trump told the crowd to “get out and vote, just this time”, adding that “you won’t have to do it any more. Four more years, you know what? It’ll be fixed, it’ll be fine, you won’t have to vote any more, my beautiful Christians.”

Democrats and other critics called the remarks “terrifying”, authoritarian and anti-democratic. And Monday, in a new interview with the Fox News host Laura Ingraham, the former president attempted to explain what he meant.

“That statement is very simple, I said, ‘Vote for me, you’re not gonna have to do it ever again,’” Trump told Ingraham. “It’s true, because we have to get the vote out. Christians are not known as a big voting group, they don’t vote. And I’m explaining that to them. You never vote. This time, vote. I’ll straighten out the country, you won’t have to vote any more, I won’t need your vote any more, you can go back to not voting.”

Ingraham pointed out that many Democrats had interpreted his comments over the weekend to mean there would never be another election again. Trump responded that he had not heard that and continued to talk about how lots of Christians tend to not vote.

“Christians do not vote well. They vote in very small percentages. Why? I don’t know. Maybe they’re disappointed in things that are happening,” Trump continued. “I say, ‘You don’t vote.’ I’m saying, ‘Go out – you must vote.’

“You have to vote” in the 5 November election, Trump continued, calling it the most important presidential race in US history. “After that you don’t have to worry about voting any more. I don’t care, because we’re going to fix it, the country will be fixed and we won’t even need your vote any more because, frankly, we will have such love.

“And I think everybody understood it.”

Ingraham pressed the former president, asking him, “But you will leave office after four years?”

Trump responded, “Of course.”

He added: “By the way …I did last time.”

Neither Ingraham nor Trump mentioned that – after Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential race – his supporters attacked the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 in an attempt to prevent Congress from certifying his electoral defeat.

A spokesperson for Trump’s campaign had previously told the Washington Post that the former president on Friday was “talking about uniting this country and bringing prosperity to every American, as opposed to the divisive political environment that has sowed so much division” that it led to the 13 July attempt on Trump’s life at a political rally in Pennsylvania.

Trump’s remarks on Friday came about two months after he apparently flirted with the idea of being president for three terms at the annual National Rifle Association convention in Dallas.

He alluded to how Franklin D Roosevelt was in the White House for three full terms – and died at the beginning of a fourth – from 1933 to 1945, during the Great Depression and the second world war.

“You know, FDR 16 years – almost 16 years – he was four terms. I don’t know, are we going to be considered three-term? Or two-term?” Trump said, prompting some in the crowd to yell “three!” Politico reported.

The 22nd amendment to the US constitution, enacted in 1951, now limits presidents to two four-year terms.

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