The Current Presidential Line of Succession

Carly Kiel
Updated January 20, 2021 67.3K views18 items

This is a list of the people in the line of succession to become President of the United States upon the death, incapacity, resignation, or removal of the acting president or president-elect. Who becomes President if Joe Biden dies? The first up is VP Kamala Harris, followed by the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. In the unlikely event that the American President dies or leaves the office, this is the order in which other U.S. politicians would be in line for to become the Acting President.

The line of succession has only come into play a few times in American history. A few times, a vice president has become president when the President has died of natural causes, which has happened 4 times:

-William Henry Harrison died in 1841 after 30 days in office; he was succeeded by John Tyler
-Zachary Taylor died in 1850 after 1 year and 4 months in office; he was succeeded by Millard Fillmore
-Warren G. Harding died in 1923, 2 years and 4 months in office; he was succeeded by Calvin Coolidge
-Franklin D. Roosevelt died in 1945 after 12 years in office, 1 month into his 4th term; he was succeeded by Harry S. Truman

Several American Vice Presidents have also risen to the presidency following the assassination of the President. This has also happened four times:

-Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, 1 month into his second term; he was succeeded by Andrew Johnson
 -James A. Garfield was assassinated in 1881, after 6 months in office; he was succeeded by Chester Arthur
 -William McKinley was assassinated in 1901, 6 months into his second term; he was succeeded by Theodore Roosevelt
-John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963 after 2 years and 10 months in office; he was succeeded by Lyndon B. Johnson

The one other time a Vice President succeeded to the Presidency followed the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974, after which Gerald Ford became President. 

Gosh, that's actually a lot of Vice Presidents who became President, when you consider that there have only been 45 total American Presidents. So far. And in "Battlestar Galactica," Secretary of Education Laura Roslin was #43! in line before the Cylons surprise attacked the Twelve Colonies and killed the whole government. I guess I'm just saying: it doesn't hurt to be prepared.

 

  • Kamala Harris
    1

    Kamala Harris

    Vice President of the United States (D) 

    Kamala Devi Harris (born October 20, 1964) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the 49th vice president of the United States. A member of the Democratic Party, Harris is the second African American woman and the first South Asian American to serve in the United States Senate. Harris became the vice president upon inauguration in 2021 alongside President Joe Biden, having defeated the incumbent president, Donald Trump, and vice president, Mike Pence, in the 2020 election. She is the United States' first female vice president, the highest-ranking female elected official in U.S. history, the first African American vice president, and the first Asian American vice president.
  • Nancy Pelosi
    2

    Speaker of the House (D)

    Nancy Patricia Pelosi (born March 26, 1940) is an American politician and a member of the Democratic Party. She has served as speaker of the United States House of Representatives since January 2019, is the only woman to have held that office, and is the highest-ranking elected woman in United States history. As speaker of the House, she is second in the presidential line of succession, immediately after the vice president.First elected to Congress in 1987, Pelosi is currently in her 17th term as a congresswoman, representing California's 12th congressional district (since 2013), which consists of four-fifths of the city and county of San Francisco. She initially represented the 5th district (1987–1993), and then, when district boundaries were redrawn after the 1990 Census, the 8th district (1993–2013). She has led House Democrats since 2003 (the first woman to lead a party in Congress), serving twice each as speaker (2007–2011 and 2019–present) and as House minority leader (2003–2007 and 2011–2019) depending upon whether Democrats or Republicans held the majority; she has also served as House minority whip (2002–2003). Pelosi was a major opponent of the Iraq War as well as the Bush Administration's 2005 attempt to privatize Social Security. During her first speakership, she was instrumental in the passage of many landmark bills, including the Affordable Care Act, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act, along with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and 2010 Tax Relief Act, which served as economic stimulus amidst the Great Recession. In the 2018 midterm elections, the Democrats won control of the House. Afterward, when the 116th Congress convened on January 3, 2019, Pelosi was elected speaker for the second time, becoming the first former speaker to return to the post since Sam Rayburn in 1955.
  • Chuck Grassley
    3

    President pro tempore of the Senate (R)

    Charles Ernest Grassley (born September 17, 1933) is an American politician serving as the President pro tempore of the United States Senate, and the senior United States Senator from Iowa. He is currently in his seventh term in the Senate, having first been elected in 1980. A member of the Republican Party, Grassley previously served eight terms in the Iowa House of Representatives (1959–1975) and three terms in the United States House of Representatives (1975–1981). He has served three stints as Senate Finance Committee Chairman during periods of Republican Senate majority. When Orrin Hatch's Senate term ended on January 3, 2019, Grassley became the most senior Republican in the Senate. He was appointed President pro tempore of the Senate for the 116th United States Congress, making him third in the presidential line of succession after the Vice President and Speaker of the House.
  • Antony Blinken
    4

    Antony Blinken

    Secretary of State (D)

    Antony John Blinken (born April 16, 1962) is an American government official and diplomat. He served as Deputy National Security Advisor from 2013 to 2015 and Deputy Secretary of State from 2015 to 2017 under President Barack Obama. Blinken has been chosen by President Joe Biden as his nominee for the position of Secretary of State. During the Clinton administration, Blinken served in the State Department and in senior positions on the National Security Council staff. He was also a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (2001–2002), Democratic Staff Director of the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (2002–2008), and a member of the Bush–Obama presidential transition, active from November 2008 to January 2009. From 2009 to 2013, Blinken served as Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President. In the private sector, Blinken co-founded WestExec Advisors, a consulting firm.
  • Janet Yellen
    5

    Secretary of the Treasury (D)

    Janet Louise Yellen (born August 13, 1946) is an American economist who was the 15th chair of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2018, the first woman to hold the role. She is a professor emerita at Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. She was vice-chair from 2010 to 2014. President Joe Biden has announced that he will nominate Yellen to serve in his Cabinet as United States Secretary of the Treasury. Yellen was a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors from 1994 to 1997 and again from 2010 to 2018. She chaired the Council of Economic Advisers under President Bill Clinton from 1997 to 1999 and was the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco from 2004 to 2010. In 2014, Yellen was nominated by President Barack Obama to succeed Ben Bernanke as chair of the Federal Reserve. She served one term from 2014 to 2018 and was not re-appointed by President Donald Trump.
  • General Lloyd Austin
    6

    General Lloyd Austin

    Secretary of Defense (D)

    Lloyd James Austin III (born August 8, 1953) is an American retired four-star Army general who served as the 12th commander of United States Central Command (CENTCOM). Austin was the first black commander of CENTCOM.[1] On December 8, 2020, President Joe Biden announced his intention to nominate Austin as Secretary of Defense.