Doing that would certainly have looked less like a power grab-I didn’t expect him to just postpone arbitrarily, or at least back off when he saw how appalled everyone was-thought he had more sense, but apparently not...
And I got a chuckle over Sam trying to lord it over Ahmed and being told that the two of them needed to have a long conversation in that threatening tone of voice-wonder if he is going to tell Sam how closely related they are-I hope so...
Tyrant II: Sammy vs Ahmed
It would also make it easier to keep American support with the facade of democratic gov’t.