WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned that Democrats would have to win “big” in 2020 or she feared President Trump would contest the results of the election.

“We have to inoculate against that, we have to be prepared for that,” she said in an interview with the New York Times that was published on Saturday.

Pelosi said she held the same view when Democrats were vying to take back the House of Representatives in the run-up to the 2018 midterm election.

“If we win by four seats, by a thousand votes each, he’s not going to respect the election,” Pelosi said. “He would poison the public mind. He would challenge each of the races, he would say you can’t seat these people.”

“We had to win. Imagine if we hadn’t won – oh, don’t even imagine. So, as we go forward, we have to have the same approach,” Pelosi added.

The California Democrat remains wary of starting impeachment hearings against the president.

Throughout his 2016 run, Trump warned supporters that the election would be “rigged.”

Since taking office he’s joked about staying longer than the eight years the Constitution would allow him to remain president.

On the day the redacted Mueller report was released to the public, Trump accepted a gift from participants of the Wounded Warrior Project Soldier Ride and said it would remain in the Oval Office for “at least six years.”

“I was going to say for at least 10 to 14 years. But we would cause bedlam, so we’ll say six,” Trump said.

Pelosi’s comments echo those made by Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen, who testified before the House Oversight Committee in late February.

“Indeed, given my experience working for Mr. Trump, I fear that if he loses the election in 2020 that there will never be a peaceful transition of power, and this is why I agree to appear before you today,” Cohen said during his appearance.