For months, Univision and Fusion anchor Jorge Ramos has been inviting to his shows prospective 2020 Democrat challengers to President Trump. Now, he’s expanded his search to include potential Republican challengers.
For his Real America series on the Fusion network, Ramos travelled to Ohio to meet with Governor John Kasich. However, don’t expect Ramos to be endorsing Kasich anytime soon.
For starters, Kasich clearly disappointed Ramos when he failed to call President Trump a racist.
JORGE RAMOS, HOST, REAL AMERICA, FUSION: Do you think Trump is a racist?
OHIO GOVERNOR JOHN KASICH: In no way would I try to define somebody as, you know, a racist or not a racist. I would never do that. What I would say that we need to make sure that we deal with the issue of race. We've done it in the state, and is it perfect? No, but have we addressed? Yes. Is it more effective? Yes.
JORGE RAMOS: Okay, but when Donald Trump says that Mexican immigrants were criminals and rapists. –
GOVERNOR KASICH: I think he's dead wrong on that.
DONALD TRUMP O/C: They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists.
JORGE RAMOS: Isn't that a racist statement?
GOVERNOR KASICH: I don't want to get into name-calling.
Though Kasich wasn’t willing to cross Ramos’ obligatory ‘racist’ bridge, he was, however, willing to join him in bashing federal immigration law enforcement. Kasich’s ICE-bashing may endear him to Ramos, but it’s not likely to endear him to law and order Republicans, however.
JOHN KASICH: These stories, where these ICE agents are going to the people's homes, to me, that's not my country. That's not the way that I think we should handle these things. I think it's dead wrong.
While Ramos was evidently pleased with Kasich’s willingness to attack Trump on issues such as immigration and climate change, in the end the Ohio Governor’s unwillingness to attack Trump personally rubbed Ramos the wrong way, as Ramos made clear in his conclusion to his latest round of 2020 candidate auditioning.
JORGE RAMOS, HOST, REAL AMERICA, FUSION: I think Governor Kasich is clearly frustrated with the tone of the national conversation. He's really frustrated, and he wants to do something about it. The real question is if he can beat Donald Trump. That's the real question. And something that I'm always wondering is if this strategy of attacking Trump's policy, without attacking the man, without attacking Trump, will work against him.
ANNOUNCER: Governor John Kasich.
JORGE RAMOS: I don't know. It didn't work in the past. I'm not sure if it's going to work in the future.
