By CASEY McDERMOTT
Monitor staff
Last modified: Wednesday, March 25, 2015
A lot has changed for John Kasich, the former congressman and sitting governor of Ohio, since the last time he visited New Hampshire.
“If I would have come here 16 years ago, they would’ve had me shovel out the driveway,” he remarked after an event at Concord’s Snowshoe Club, where a long line of cars filled the narrow driveway outside. “And now there’s, what – 100 people here tonight. And look, they’re still here.”
Kasich pointed over to Tommi Hall of Bedford and Janet Gagne of Hooksett – who were still lingering as most of the other guests started to trickle out.
“Ladies,” Kasich asked, “it go okay?”
“Yes,” the women responded back. “Awesome!”
Kasich, who campaigned in the 2000 presidential primary but ultimately dropped out of the race, wasn’t quite ready to commit to another candidacy – or to talk much about whether he’d set up a political action committee, or what kind of campaign staff he’d build, or when locals might be able to expect to see him again in New Hampshire.
But in Concord last night, Kasich was eager to talk about his record as a leader overseeing a period of resurgence for the Buckeye State, and his ability to govern in an environment that doesn’t fit neatly into one political or demographic category. In his words, “Ohio is a microcosm of America.”
“Did you ever notice when you’re watching the presidential election that they never tell you who won the presidential election until the next day? Because it’s that kind of a place,” Kasich said. “And people are intelligent. You know what they don’t want? They don’t want extremists. They want problem solvers and they want people who are optimistic that can give everybody a chance.”
That’s something, in his view, that the Republican Party shouldn’t lose sight of in its approach to policy priorities. At one point during his remarks, Kasich paused to ask whether anyone in the room had a family member with a developmental disability. A few hands went up.
“Anybody in this room? Yeah, well you know what it’s like when they’re ignored,” Kasich said, arguing that politicians need not lose sight of taking care of the neediest citizens. “We know they’re made differently, but they’re made special. And we give them a chance to be successful.”
Providing support and treatment for people dealing with substance abuse and mental health issues is also imperative, he added. Too often, Kasich said, his Republican colleagues place too much emphasis on economic growth – “and that’s the end of the story.”
“When a country has more economic growth, we can do more for the folks who do live in the shadows,” Kasich said. “I believe that addressing those problems communicates a very basic message to people – and that is maybe those leaders get me, care about me, are concerned about me and understand me. And that is where we have missed as Republicans, in my opinion.”
Some 100-plus people gathered for the event with Kasich, the second in a new “Politics and Pie” series organized by the Concord Republican City Committee and New Hampshire’s Republican National Committee members.
The two women to whom Kasich nodded at the end of the night, Hall and Gagne, said Kasich was the first possible 2016 contender they’d seen in person this cycle – and he made a good first impression.
“I think after what we have had for the last six years, it was nice to hear somebody who had some common sense,” Hall said, adding that she appreciated that he expressed interest in balancing the federal budget.
“He truly is a problem solver,” Gagne later added. “And I like that.”
Jim McConaha, treasurer for the Concord City Republican Committee, said he hopes Kasich “catches on.”
“He’s the kind of candidate that I like to see running,” McConaha said. “The Republican field, as you know, I think are dozens – most of them are going nowhere, and for good reason. But I think this guy falls in the leadership group. . . . He has vast experience, and that’s what we need.”
(Casey McDermott can be reached at 369-3306 or cmcdermott@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @caseymcdermott.)