GOP field adds 16th in Kasich

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio Gov. John Kasich joined the 2016 presidential race Tuesday, carrying a message of fiscal conservatism and social-welfare compassion that he hopes will shake up the Republican Party and vault him into contention for the party's nomination.

Saying "big ideas change the world," Kasich, 63, started his campaign at Ohio State University before a crowd of 2,000. He is the 16th Republican to enter the nomination race.

"I am here to ask you for your prayers, for your support, for your efforts because I have decided to run for president," Kasich said in a 43-minute speech packed with family anecdotes, historical references and calls for national renewal.

A veteran congressman as well as governor, Kasich told voters he is the only GOP candidate with experience in three broad areas of political leadership: the federal budget, national security and state government. He also spent nearly a decade at Lehman Brothers, a global financial services firm that declared bankruptcy in 2008.

"I have the experience and the testing," he said, "the testing which shapes you and prepares you for the most important job in the world, and I believe I know how to work and help restore this great United States."

The son of a postman from working-class McKees Rocks, Pa., Kasich won his first election, to the Ohio state Senate, when he was 24. At 30, in 1982, he won a seat in Congress, becoming the only Republican that year to defeat an incumbent Democrat.

He went on to lead the House Budget Committee and led a successful effort to balance the federal budget in 1997, when Bill Clinton was president. Kasich also highlighted his national security credentials Tuesday; he spent 18 years on the House Armed Services Committee.

Now in his second term in swing state Ohio, Kasich has helped erase a budget deficit projected at nearly $8 billion when he entered office, boosted Ohio's rainy-day fund to a historic high and seen private-sector employment rebound to its pre-recession level.

All that was achieved through budget cutting, privatization of parts of Ohio's government and other, often business-style innovations.

"We didn't really have to slash things," Kasich said of the budget squeeze. "We just had to use a 21st-century formula."

But former state Sen. Nina Turner, a Cleveland Democrat who allied with Kasich on such efforts as community-police relations, said she voted against every one of what she said were "pass-the-buck budgets" by Kasich.

"We cannot be celebrating and dancing happily on the state level, meanwhile there are more school levies on the ballot and local governments have to look into the faces of their citizens and say, 'I either have to raise your taxes, or I have to cut this service,'" she said.

Labor unions, which turned back an effort by Kasich and fellow Republicans to limit public workers' collective-bargaining rights, said Kasich's successes came at a cost to local governments and schools and that new Ohio jobs lack the pay and benefits of the ones they replaced.

On Tuesday, scores of demonstrators gathered across the street from Kasich's event to protest his cuts to the budget and to school districts, as well as his closing of centers for people with developmental disabilities.

"I'm here to make sure that the nation knows, as John Kasich announces his run for president, that he is not an advocate for anybody that is vulnerable," said Melissa Svigelj, 42, an educator from suburban Cleveland. "Unless you are part of the 1 percent, Kasich is not your friend."

But others showed up to support Kasich, including Margo Bishop, 77, of Gahanna, Ohio, who said she values his candor.

"I just like his honesty," she said. "I think he's speaking out, and even if I don't agree all the time, at least he's saying something."

Kasich embraces conservative ideals, but he also has bucked his party on occasion. He disdains the Republican bashing of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination.

"There are some that will try to divide us. We see it all the time," he said Tuesday. "I don't pay attention to that nonsense."

In seeking his party's nomination, Kasich joins a diverse Republican lineup with two Hispanics, a black man, one woman and several younger candidates alongside older white men.

So many are running that it's unclear whether Kasich will qualify for the GOP's first debate in his home state in two weeks. Only the top 10 candidates in national polling will be on stage. Ohio is a critical swing state; no candidate since John F. Kennedy in 1960 has won the White House without winning Ohio.

In recent months, Kasich has made trips to the early-voting states of New Hampshire, South Carolina, Iowa, New York and Michigan. After his speech, he returned to New Hampshire for several days of town hall-style meetings with voters.

Leading the Kasich campaign in New Hampshire is John Sununu, a former senator, who warmed up the crowd Tuesday by reminding them of Kasich's work in Washington.

"He helped us achieve things that we honestly did not think we had in us," Sununu said.

A political action committee supporting Kasich's election, New Day for America, has already spent more than $2 million on television advertising in the Boston market, which reaches into New Hampshire. A new ad began running there Tuesday.

New Day for America reported raising $11.5 million on Kasich's behalf before his entry into the race.

Trump pushes back

As Kasich joined the GOP primary race, fellow Republican Donald Trump pushed back Tuesday against party members who are fed up with his recent provocations, disclosing one opponent's cellphone number in a speech.

Fellow GOP presidential contender Sen. Lindsey Graham called Trump a "jackass," only to see floods of Trump supporters jam his phone line after Trump read Graham's number to an audience.

Trump is now at odds with much of the Republican establishment after a series of comments, topped by his weekend mocking of Arizona Sen. John McCain's experience as a tortured prisoner of war in Vietnam.

Since then, the real estate developer and reality TV host has intensified his criticism of McCain and his record on veterans issues in the Senate, even as politicians from both parties and veterans groups have rushed to McCain's defense.

In a speech to hundreds of supporters in Bluffton, S.C., on Tuesday, Trump kept on McCain, accusing him of being soft on illegal immigration.

"He's totally about open borders and all this stuff," Trump said.

McCain sparked Trump's temper last week when the senator said the businessman's inflammatory remarks about Mexicans had brought out the "crazies." McCain said Tuesday that he would no longer respond to Trump's comments.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., on Tuesday attacked Trump for his comments about McCain, then criticized the broader Republican field for not denouncing a Trump speech in which he called Mexicans "criminals" and "rapists."

"There is an ugly truth behind that silence, and it is this: When it comes to immigration policy, there is no meaningful difference between the Republican Party and Donald Trump," Reid asserted.

Republicans want to insert considerable distinctions between themselves and Trump. Responding to him only emboldens him, several in the GOP acknowledged Tuesday.

Graham, a McCain friend and another Republican running for the presidential nomination, showed the growing exasperation and anger of many in the party when he appeared earlier on CBS This Morning.

"Don't be a jackass," Graham said. "Run for president. But don't be the world's biggest jackass."

He said Trump had "crossed the line with the American people" and predicted this would be "the beginning of the end with Donald Trump."

Trump responded during his speech by calling Graham an "idiot" and a "lightweight." He then read out the senator's cellphone number to the capacity crowd of 540 people and the TV audience.

"Give it a shot," Trump encouraged. "He won't fix anything, but I think he'll talk to you."

Graham's voice mailbox was full Tuesday afternoon. Spokesman Brittany Brammell confirmed the number was his.

Graham later posted on Twitter: "Probably getting a new phone. iPhone or Android?"

National Guard firearms

Elsewhere Tuesday, another Republican contender, Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, issued an executive order authorizing Wisconsin National Guard personnel to carry firearms while on duty in the wake of an attack on a pair of military facilities in Chattanooga, Tenn.

The governor's order directed Maj. Gen. Don Dunbar, who oversees the Wisconsin National Guard, to arm guard personnel "as reasonably necessary." Walker also said in a news release that he ordered Dunbar to review the long-term security plans for all of the guard's facilities.

"Safety must be our top priority, especially in light of the horrific attack in Chattanooga," Walker said in the release.

Dunbar immediately ordered the posting of armed guardsmen at the guard's four storefront recruiting stations in Eau Claire, La Crosse, Madison and Milwaukee, said Maj. Paul Rickert, the guard's spokesman. Visitors to those locations should be prepared to have their bags searched, Rickert said.

Walker's order comes after a gunman killed four U.S. Marines and a Navy sailor at two Chattanooga military facilities Thursday.

Walker also has called for an end on a ban on service members carrying guns in federally operated military recruiting offices. Trump and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, two other Republicans seeking the presidential nomination, called for an end to the ban Friday, the same day as Walker.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, yet another GOP presidential hopeful, issued an executive order Friday authorizing his state's National Guard leader to arm personnel. A number of other governors have issued similar orders, including Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas.

Also Tuesday, Walker's top adviser said three groups supporting Walker's run for president have raised $32 million -- less than what two of his Republican rivals have collected but on target with the Wisconsin governor's goal for this point in the campaign.

Walker's fundraising pales in comparison to the $114 million Bush collected through the end of June from his super political action committee and campaign committee. Walker's $32 million also falls behind Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, whose campaign and two outside groups raised $44.7 million through June.

Information for this article was contributed by Julie Carr Smyth, Erica Werner, Meg Kinnard, Jill Colvin, Bill Barrow, Jonathan Lemire, Todd Richmond and Scott Bauer of The Associated Press; and by Sheryl Gay Stolberg of The New York Times.

A Section on 07/22/2015