Donald Trump is throwing his name back into the Presidential ring.

The real estate mogul-turned-reality show star told CBS News that if the Republican party doesn't nominate "the right person" he might enter the race in May – as a third-party candidate.

"Come May, when the Celebrity Apprentice is completed, my contract to NBC is completed, I'm a free agent, as the expression goes," he said. "I can make a decision. You know, obviously it would have to be as an independent."

Trump, whose campaign impulses seem to coincide with his reality show's schedule, withdrew from the presidential race last May as his latest season of "Celebrity Apprentice" wound down.

Some observers never believed he was serious about the run that time, pointing to his antics regarding the validity of President Obama's birth certificate.

"This was simply a transparent self-promotional stunt from a clownish conspiracy theorist," Democratic strategist Don Newman told the San Francisco Gate in May. "Plus he would never reveal his financial holdings – as required of all candidates – because he ain't as rich as he wants people to believe."

Members of his own party also dismissed the first run as a showboat move.

“The guy’s smarter than this. And you know, the idea that President Obama was not born in Hawaii, making that the centerpiece of his campaign, means that he’s just a joke candidate,” former Bush advisor Karl Rove said on Fox News in April.

Regardless of whether it was all just a publicity stunt, his influence is such that several Republican presidential candidates have sought out face-time with the Donald.

But as the race for the Republican nomination has been consumed by scandals and slip-ups, Trump has upped his rhetoric on Twitter voicing disdain for Obama and his policies.

On Tuesday, by 5:30 pm he had tweeted that Obama would start a war with Iran to get elected, that America's trade deficit with China was one of our greatest national security threats, slammed the stimulus package and plugged his new book.

He also posted a YouTube video slamming Obama for coming to New York for a fundraising and inconveniencing the city – especially when tourists are here to see the tree.

"This President is a very different person than people know," he ranted. "He's very inconsiderate. Stop with the fundraisers and start running the country because you are doing one hell of a lousy job."