GOP leaders reportedly want John Kasich to drop out of the race ASAP

(Image credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

last updated 2 March 2016

If some Republican leaders have their way, John Kasich will be bowing out of the presidential race sooner rather than later.

BuzzFeed reports that three sources close to Mitch McConnell said the Senate majority leader is becoming increasingly irritated by Kasich staying in the race, impeding Republicans from coming together around one candidate, and even some of Kasich's allies are going to start strongly urging him to drop out. With the Ohio governor still in the running, some GOP leaders say he's taking away votes that could be going to a candidate in a better position to defeat Donald Trump — for instance, on Super Tuesday, Kasich received about 9 percent of the vote in Virginia, a state that Marco Rubio lost to Trump by less than 5 points.

Kasich has said he won't exit the race until after Ohio, but one Republican told BuzzFeed it looks like maybe Kasich "made a deal with the devil. Why else is he in the race? Kasich needs to look GOP voters in the eye and tell us whether he has a deal — explicit or implicit — with Donald Trump for a spot on the ticket." Ryan Williams, who worked for Mitt Romney in 2012, said Kasich is running a "vanity campaign," and he can expect plenty of private and public calls to leave the race now. "People should realize that a vote for Kasich at this point is a vote for Trump," he said. "It's time for John Kasich to take a hint and read the handwriting on the wall."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Subscribe to The Week

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox