Kasich Campaign Press Release - John Kasich is Rising Fast

Note: "[K]asich is now fighting for second place in the 'first in the nation' New Hampshire primary, which takes place Feb. 9. So what happens if he does nab second — or better — after spending almost the entire campaign season in single digits in the polls? 'It would be all of the sudden the whole media would be talking about John Kasich,' he said. The point being: Then anything would be possible for him."

Why John Kasich really could beat Donald Trump and Ted Cruz for the Republican nomination

By Douglas Perry

The Oregonian

Ohio Gov. John Kasich has faith. In the Almighty, yes — he's a committed Christian. But also in Republican primary voters.

"People will settle down and start looking for someone who is a reformer and who has accomplished things," he told Time magazine this week. "I believe that, at the end, they will want someone who can land the plane."

The long-shot presidential candidate is convinced, of course, that he can land the plane. And that front-runners Donald Trump and Ted Cruz would crash that sucker into the side of a mountain.

To the surprise of many observers, voters just might be coming around to his point of view. Kasich believes climate change is a very real problem and that law-abiding undocumented workers should be allowed to stay in the country — views that contradict the message that has fueled Trump and Cruz. And yet Kasich is now fighting for second place in the "first in the nation" New Hampshire primary, which takes place Feb. 9.

So what happens if he does nab second — or better — after spending almost the entire campaign season in single digits in the polls?

"It would be all of the sudden the whole media would be talking about John Kasich," he said.

The point being: Then anything would be possible for him.

The 63-year-old governor, the son of a mailman and the grandson of coal miners, believes his secret weapon is that he's not an angry man. The working-class side of the Republican base is very angry and has been pushing its presidential candidates to show them their matching rage — about disappearing jobs, about illegal immigrants, about Muslims, about President Obama, about anything and everything. As a result, a lot of candidates are going for that very vocal angry vote — and there's only so much of it to go around. Trump, Cruz, Chris Christie and now a newly mad Marco Rubio could all end up knocking each other out.

Kasich, pundits are beginning to believe, could then step over them into the lead. His approach is a folksy form of straightforward retail politics that he's convinced will serve him well as the primary-election calendar moves south and west: "Meet people. Tell the truth. Talk to them. Have fun."

Read the full article here.

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Note: "His poll numbers here are moving in the right direction. The airwaves, now so cluttered and so noxious, have become so much white noise. 'I think what really matters then is the ground game,'' Kasich said. "I think we have the best ground game. There's never been a better ground game.''

John Kasich Sees An Opening in New Hampshire

By Thomas Farragher

The Boston Globe

HILLSBOROUGH, N.H., — You've seen him there on the edge of the stage, in the far corner of your TV screen as the Republican presidential field take turns talking about building big walls, dropping bombs, and — like crazed fast-food joint workers — asking whether you'd like some guns with that burger.

In some of those split-screen reaction shots, as the front-running demagogue Donald Trump blends hate speech with paper-thin policy, I've wondered: What is it exactly that Ohio Governor John Kasich is thinking?

"Generally, what I'm thinking is: God, I wish they'd ask me the same question so I could answer it,'' Kasich told me aboard his campaign bus here Tuesday. "But I'd rather have people see that I'm positive and happy than get this extra time. These debates are not a great way to pick a president, to tell you the truth.''

Kasich brought his happy-face tour to Morse Sporting Goods on Tuesday, a place where you can get a fishing license for $45, a Buck knife for $54.99, and a bottle of doe urine that will run you $5.50. You can also find proprietor-emeritus Walt Morse, a former New Hampshire state trooper who for 10 years was the elected Hillsborough County sheriff.

"He's a good person and he's got a good plan,'' Morse, 81, told me before he showed Kasich around the place. "I just want the country to be safe and prosperous.''

That's what Kasich wants, too. And, he told a small group of voters here, it's not that difficult to deliver. "Can you believe I said that?'' he said. "It's very easy. You know what gets in the way? Politics.''

Of course, that's like saying the only problem with flight is gravity.

Kasich is embarking on a bit of gravity defying business himself these days. He's in second place in some New Hampshire primary polls. He has virtually moved here full-time until the state votes on Feb. 9.

Kasich is a serious guy. He's a former nine-term congressman and House Budget Committee chairman. He left Washington in 2001 and returned to politics in 2010 when he was elected Ohio's governor.

He's a staunch abortion opponent, but in a field where there's not a yardstick big enough to measure how far right the far right has drifted, Kasich is a voice of relative moderation.

"You can go into the room as the prince of darkness and you can get everybody depressed and down,'' he said. "Or you can go in as the prince of light and tell people: Yeah, we have problems but they're not that hard because I don't really believe they're that hard. Everything doesn't have to be a trip to get a root canal.''

If presidential politics is all about timing, Kasich is hoping that the ground game he's built here will help prove his timing fortuitous. He has dismissed suggestions that he's the 2016 version of Jon Huntsman, the former Utah governor who also bet the house on New Hampshire and bowed out four years ago after finishing third.

And if he's taking anything for granted, the voters are happy to bring him up short. "I was really excited, this lady told me: ‘You're in my top six,'"he said.

His poll numbers here are moving in the right direction. The airwaves, now so cluttered and so noxious, have become so much white noise. "I think what really matters then is the ground game,'' Kasich said. "I think we have the best ground game. There's never been a better ground game.''

To read the full article, click here.