Ohio Gov. John Kasich is dropping out of the 2016 presidential election, just one day after Ted Cruz bowed out of the race. This leaves Donald Trump as the likely GOP nominee come election time in November.
According to Politico, a senior campaign adviser of Kasich’s announced the news Wednesday afternoon. Kasich only won his home state of Ohio in the primaries, garnering 156 delegates according to CNN. This left him in fourth place behind Trump, Cruz and Marco Rubio (who dropped out of the race after the Florida primaries), respectively. Politico reported that Kasich’s campaign cancelled Washington D.C. events to begin staging a news conference set for 5 p.m. in Columbus, Ohio—which is likely when he will officially announce the end of his presidential bid.
On Tuesday night, Ted Cruz suspended his campaign after losing in Indiana. “From the beginning I’ve said that I would continue on as long as there was a viable path to victory. Tonight, I’m sorry to say, it appears that path has been foreclosed,” Cruz said Tuesday according to CNBC. Trump had overwhelmingly won in Indiana, taking all of the state’s 57 delegates.
“The voters chose another path, and so with a heavy heart, but with boundless optimism for the long-term future of our nation, we are suspending our campaign,” Cruz said.
Cruz and Kasich teamed up earlier last week to stop Trump from reaching the necessary 1,237 delegates, which would lead to an open GOP convention this summer. Kasich has long been mathematically eliminated from the race, needing an impossible amount of delegates to be nominated. His only hope was to make it to the convention and somehow get nominated in lieu of Trump. However, Cruz dropping out of the race essentially sealed off this path, according to Vox. The Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus declared that Trump was the presumptive nominee after Cruz bowed out.
According to the New York Times writer Thomas Kaplan, Kasich was the “conventional candidate in an unconventional race.” Kasich tried to remain the adult during debates when childish insults were thrown around, even as his competition won in many of the contests.
This effectively leaves Donald Trump as the GOP nominee, despite about $43.3 million in expenditures by Never Trump groups to stop his campaign, according to CNBC. Never thought you would see Trump make it to a major presidential competition? Think again, collegiettes, because it looks like that’s exactly what’s going to happen.