Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) said the GOP is “shrinking” and encouraged voters to choose candidates based on their values, not political parties.
Kasich appeared on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday and shared his view on the current state of the Republican Party.
{mosads}”Unfortunately, our party is shrinking,” Kasich said. “We’re now down to about 25 percent. It’s all becoming like a remnant.”
Kasich pointed to the nail-biter special election between Republican House candidate Troy Balderson and Democrat Danny O’Connor in Ohio last month.
The pair were competing in the state’s 12th Congressional District — a red district that President Trump won by 11 points in 2016.
Balderson was declared the winner more than two weeks after polls closed by a margin of 0.8 percent — or 1,680 votes.
Kasich said Balderson won by “the skin of his teeth” but added that he didn’t think he would need much help on the campaign trail again in November, this time for a full two-year term in the House.
There are some Republicans, however, that Kasich said he will not be campaigning for.
“I just won’t do it. Because you’re a divider, and if you can’t see the fact that we need to unify people, then I can’t be for you,” Kasich said Sunday. “Nothing personal. I just can’t help you.”
All the major political parties go through periods of decline, he added.
“You know, we spend so much time talking about how lost the Republicans are, but you think about the Democratic Party moving farther and farther to the left,” Kasich said. “Our country is center-right or center-left. It’s not on the extremes. Your political party shouldn’t matter so much. Vote for the person.”
The former GOP presidential candidate said that he would run as a Republican, however, if he decided to launch a 2020 bid.
Kasich said Sunday that he’s “going to do my level best” to help the Republican Party.
“But at the end I worry about my country,” he said.
“I worry about my country being a great leader in the world,” he added. “I want my country, where the people that live in this country, whoever they are, to feel as though they have a hope they’re respected and they can be successful.”