Erick Erickson: Kasich Would Be Like ‘John Wilkes Booth’ If He Runs For Prez

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Erick Erickson, editor-in-chief of the conservative website RedState.com, wrote Wednesday that Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) would only enter the 2016 GOP presidential race to “take out another Republican” like assassin John Wilkes Booth.

Erickson’s comments about Kasich, who has been considering entering the race, were made in a blog post for “The Erick Erickson Show” and in an email to his subscribers.

“John Kasich does not want to be President. He wants to be the guy who scuttles the chances of other candidates,” Erickson wrote. “This isn’t a Presidential campaign, it is John Wilkes Booth acting on a debate stage until he can take out another Republican. Metaphorically speaking, of course.”

Erickon derided Kasich for his aspirations.

“Kasich has, no doubt, looked in the mirror every day since he left Fox News calling himself ‘Mr. President.’” Erickson wrote. “But Kasich is not now running to be President. Surely, like the gorilla putting on a lion’s mane and calling himself Aslan, Kasich will put on the Brooks Brothers tie and call himself a presidential candidate, but that does not make him a White House contender.”

Erickson also said Kasich recently hired two campaign consultants who were meant to “knife other candidates in the back” and “take [them] out.”

“Put more bluntly, one does not run for President in the Republican Party by hiring consultants who hate the Republican base to run the campaign of a Republican who says publicly Jesus wants him to expand government,” Erickson wrote. “One runs that way to destroy others within the primary process.”

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