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Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and his wife Jane, gesture at supporters as they take a walk in New York's Times Square, Tuesday, April 19. | AP Photo Jane Sanders predicts epic Bernie comeback

Bernie Sanders may be down, but he is certainly not out of the race, Jane Sanders said Thursday, as she predicted that her husband would win a slew of victories going forward into May and beyond that will keep him competitive leading up to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

"You remember in mid-March after a string of losses, the media wrote his political obituary and we came back to win eight in a row," she said in an interview with MSNBC's "Morning Joe" from Burlington, Vermont, adding, "So we're expecting to do the same here."

The comments come a day after the Sanders campaign began laying off hundreds of campaign workers in states that voted Tuesday rather than having them stay on for future contests. Sanders' campaign dismissed the notion that the layoffs represent a posture of weakness with campaign spokesman Michael Briggs telling POLITICO on Wednesday that it comes "from a posture of reality."

"It was a difficult time," Jane Sanders said of the recent electoral defeats. "We knew that New York had 3 million independents that couldn't vote in the closed primary and they would have had to change their party registration back in October last year."

"Four out of the five contests that were just done last Tuesday were closed primaries again," she continued. "The open primary, Rhode Island, we won. Connecticut, we came very, very close, and if it had been an open primary, we have no doubt we would have won. Pennsylvania, we would have come close or won."

The campaign, she said, is "feeling good."

"And most of the primaries going forward are open, which I think is much more democratic," she said. "It's also a smarter move for the Democratic Party because if you close the primary and you only have people that have been in the Democratic Party for years, what you are doing is effectively shutting the door on the millions of people that Bernie has brought into the political process during this election. So we're going to go forward."

Sanders said it was "disappointing" that her husband hadn't been able to attract more minority voters, but said the campaign was going to aggressively make the case on issues "that affect them."

"His general bold vision for the future actually affects them disproportionately," she argued, "because, as you say, a lot of them have lower incomes, they are concerned about the cost of higher education, and a number of the issues that Bernie puts out there."