Former Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), who has claimed President Barack Obama’s foreign policy would lead to the rapture, says she is advising Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on foreign policy.
Speaking to reporters outside a private fundraiser that Trump held in Minneapolis on Friday evening, the 2012 GOP presidential hopeful and tea party stalwart said she has known Trump for several years and supports his proposals to crack down on immigration and terrorism.
“He also recognizes there is a threat around the world, not just here in Minnesota, of radical Islam,” she told Minnesota Public Radio. “I wish our President Obama also understood the threat of radical Islam and took it seriously.”
Bachmann also serves on the real estate mogul’s evangelical advisory board, working on outreach to conservative voters.
Last month, she warned that Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton would create “certain destruction” and “catastrophic decline” if elected president. She also celebrated Trump for his “1950s sensibilities” and “1950s common sense,” and argued that because he “gets and understands religious liberty,” people of all faiths will be allowed to say “Merry Christmas” during a Trump presidency.
Like Trump, Bachmann is an avid conspiracy theorist. Last fall, when she visited Israel, she argued that there is violence and unrest in the country because Jesus is “coming soon.” She warned Christians that they must convert as many people as possible, “even among the Jews.”
In 2011, when Trump raised questions about whether Obama was born in the U.S., Bachmann was among the GOP lawmakers calling for the release of Obama’s birth certificate, though she did say that “if the President says that he was born here, then I take him at his word.”
It was unclear why Trump was campaigning in Bachmann’s home state; a GOP presidential nominee hasn’t won there since 1972. While polling on Minnesota is limited, most results indicate that Clinton has a comfortable lead.
But during Friday’s fundraiser, Trump claimed he has “so many friends” in the state and hopes to visit “a lot,” according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.
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