Bachmann: Trump gets nomination if he’s ‘within striking distance’

Michele Bachmann on Wednesday predicted Donald Trump will become the GOP presidential nominee even if he’s a few delegates short at the Republican National Convention in July.

“If Donald Trump is within striking distance of the magic number, that gives him the nomination automatically. I don’t think you’ll see a scrapping fight at the convention,” she said of the upcoming event in Cleveland on CNN. “Because people will have spoken.”

{mosads}Bachmann then argued that the Republican rank-and-file would coalesce around any potential front-runner in July, not just Trump.

“Vice versa, I think if it’s Cruz and he gets the requisite number of delegates or very close, I think he gets the nomination,” she said of Trump’s closest rival for the Republican presidential mantle. “I think it would be too divisive in our party [otherwise].”

Bachmann, a former GOP House representative from Minnesota, added that the Democratic presidential primary may have a similar scenario on its hands.

“Just like now with Hillary Clinton, she effectively is the Democratic nominee even though all the juice and energy is behind Bernie Sanders,” the 2012 GOP presidential candidate said.

“I think there would be a meltdown once the candidates got to the Democratic convention and the nod was given to Bernie Sanders as opposed to Hillary Clinton,” she added of the event in Philadelphia next July.

Trump on Tuesday won five out of six GOP presidential primary contests, putting his delegate total at 673 out of the 1,237 needed for clinching the Republican nomination.

Clinton, meanwhile, shut out Sanders in all six Democratic contest, earning her 1,606 delegates out of the 2,382 needed for their party’s presidential mantle.