Fact check: Has any two-term president ever served as vice president (e.g., examples in U.S. history)?

1. A direct claim: which two-term presidents once held the vice presidency and why it matters

The core claim under scrutiny is whether any president who served two terms had previously served as vice president. The sources agree that several presidents were vice presidents before becoming president, but they differ on which of those went on to serve two full presidential terms. Primary lists of vice presidents and presidents show Thomas Jefferson as a vice president who later won two presidential terms, making him the clearest example. The compiled lists and summaries in the materials emphasize patterns—some vice presidents later became one-term presidents, others succeeded midterm, and a few ran again—so Jefferson’s path (VP → two elected terms) is historically distinct in the documentation provided ^{[1] [4]}.

2. Who appears on the lists: multiple vice presidents became president, but most did not serve two full terms

The datasets and lists cited enumerate vice presidents who later became president: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, Richard Nixon, George H.W. Bush, and others are named across the sources. Those summaries show that several vice presidents achieved the presidency, but most did not go on to serve two complete terms after their vice presidency. For example, the summaries note Nixon’s and Bush’s later presidencies and point out a variety of outcomes—election, succession after assassination, or loss of reelection—so the raw pattern is mixed rather than uniform. The sources present these names consistently but do not conflate being vice president with necessarily becoming a two-term president ^{[5] [1]}.

3. Thomas Jefferson: the clean historical example highlighted by the materials

Among the cases reviewed, Thomas Jefferson is identified as the unambiguous instance of a vice president who later served two full presidential terms. The lists of vice presidents and presidents included in the documents indicate Jefferson’s vice presidency under John Adams followed by his two elected presidential terms from 1801 to 1809. The sources emphasize him as a precedent when asking whether a two-term president ever previously held the vice presidency, setting him apart from those who served one term, succeeded midterm, or returned for nonconsecutive service ^{[1] [3]}.

4. Complications and near-misses the sources flag — succession, resignation, and nonconsecutive terms

The materials also surface important qualifications that complicate a simple count. Some figures who served as vice president and later occupied the presidency did so by succession (upon a death), did not complete two terms, or served two nonconsecutive terms, which matters for strict definitions. The sources note vice presidents like John C. Calhoun and George Clinton who served under multiple presidents, and others like Richard Nixon who had lengthy vice presidential service before later becoming president; these variations illustrate how tenure paths vary and why Jefferson’s VP→two-term presidential case is distinctive in the provided accounts ^{[3] [2]}.

5. Bottom line and what the provided sources collectively imply for the question

Based on the lists and analyses provided, the correct, evidence-backed answer is: yes—Thomas Jefferson is a documented example of a two-term president who had previously served as vice president. The material shows multiple vice presidents became president, but Jefferson uniquely combined VP service with two full elected presidential terms in the historical records cited. The sources also invite caution about other cases because succession, resignation, incomplete terms, and nonconsecutive presidencies can produce plausible-seeming counterexamples that do not meet the strict test of “two full terms after serving as vice president” ^{[1] [4]}.