On Sunday morning, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” if he believed it was likely that Americans would come “together once the [presidential] election is over,” regardless of whether Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump wins.

Gingrich, a Trump campaign adviser and one-time shortlister to be Trump’s running mate, answered with a hard “no,” and went on to predict massive, years-long dysfunction in governing.

“I think tragically we have drifted into an environment where if Hillary is elected, the criminal investigations will be endless, and if Trump is elected, it will be just like Madison, Wisconsin, with Scott Walker,” Gingrich told host Chuck Todd. “The opposition of the government employee unions will be so hostile and so direct and so immediate, that it will be a continuing fight over who controls the country. I think that we are in for a long, difficult couple of years, maybe a decade or more, because the gap between those of us who are deeply offended by the dishonesty and the corruption and the total lack of honesty on the Clinton team, and on their side, their defense of unions...that will lead to a Madison, Wisconsin kind of struggle if Trump wins.”

Gingrich concluded by stating, “I wish it wasn't true, Chuck.”

—Asawin Suebsaeng