We declared mid-March that the general election would fall to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, but vice president positions are still up for grabs.
While Ohio governor John Kasich has stated that he doesn’t want the position, I’m inclined to think he does. In regards to his impossible shot at the presidency, Kasich has climbed past Cruz to score second place in Maryland, Connecticut, and New York.
“I’m not going to be anybody’s vice president,” Kasich declared Monday night on CNN. “I would be the worst vice president the country every saw. You know why? Because I’m not like a vice president. I’m a president. Look, I’m running for the top job. And if I don’t get the top job, OK, I’m still governor of Ohio.”
With less than a week to go before the pivotal New York primary, Newt Gingrich brings up the fact that “Kasich is doing a little better than people expected. Cruz is doing worse than people expected…it’s very hard to argue you are the key alternative when you are in third place.”
Kasich hopes delegates at the open Republican convention this summer in Ohio will look at his electability and record when choosing a candidate. But when you look at the numbers, Kasich’s odds of winning the presidency are virtually zero (unless Ted Cruz and Donald Trump were to die in a bus accident). Kasich is smart. He has to know this. So why hasn’t he dropped out of the race?
Despite his claims about not wanting to be chosen as vice president, I think he has a different agenda in mind. Kasich’s traditional Republican stance could make him the perfect partner to balance out Donald Trump and assuage the fears of GOP higher-ups who worry that Trump is too much of an anti-establishmentarian.
Editor’s note: We talked about game theory and why politicians stay in a race they can’t win in this article. While Ted Cruz may be all in to cheat Trump out of the nomination, I believe John Kasich knows what damage it will do to the party, and has the maturity to reject underhanded maneuvers. But I don’t believe he will turn down Vice Presidency, since if he truly wants to be President in the long run it’s his best shot. In any event, every week he campaigns he gains more and more prestige and public recognition, so for Kasich staying in is game theory maximum payoff!