Kasich: I'm not running in 2020 with Hickenlooper

Ohio Gov. John Kasich said Sunday that he and Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper will not form a bipartisan ticket for a 2020 presidential bid, shooting down rumors that the pair had been considering such a move.

“Chuck, look, Kasich/Hickenlooper. You couldn’t--first of all, you couldn't pronounce it. And secondly, you couldn't fit it on a bumper sticker,” the Ohio governor, a Republican who ran for the GOP nomination in 2016 and has been a vocal critic of President Donald Trump’s, said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”


Pressed by host Chuck Todd that his bumper sticker answer fell short of a denial, Kasich offered a more emphatic answer: “The answer is no, OK?”

Kasich and Hickenlooper, a Democrat, have worked together recently on repairing the nation’s healthcare system. That the two men might join together for a 2020 bid, with Kasich at the top of the ticket, was first reported last week by Axios and CNN — and shot down by Hickenlooper on Twitter.

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“Odd & funny that people expect a political marriage when 2 people from different parties work together. Kasich is dapper & worldly, but knows nada about brewing beer,” the Colorado governor, who founded a brewery in Denver before entering politics, wrote on Twitter. “Loving the attention on our bipartisan work but no ulterior motive. Not a unity ticket, just working with a new friend on hard compromises.”

Kasich, too, expressed surprise and exasperation at the notion that members of opposing political parties working together might trigger speculation about ulterior motives.

“I do want people to think about this, because Hickenlooper and I work together, cynics out there say, ‘Well, they want something,’” Kasich said.

“You know, sometimes people actually do things because they're trying to help somebody. And when we do that everybody ought not to say, ‘Well, what's in it for them?’ This growing cynicism eats at the fabric of the spirit of our country. It really aggravates — there’s not much that aggravates me. That does.”