Ohio Gov. John Kasich said President Trump needs to “settle it down” when it comes to so many White House staff shakeups.
“The problem you have is when you have chaos among your staff — staff in, staff out, new people here, new people there — it’s hard to get anything done,” the 2016 Republican presidential hopeful told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” Sunday morning.
Kasich was responding to a question about Steve Bannon, the president’s chief strategist who departed the White House on Friday.
The Trump administration had a turbulent week following the president’s comments on the deadly violence in Charlottesville, Va., last weekend and failure to settle on outright condemning white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups.
Bannon became the sixth top official since the beginning of July to exit Trump’s administration.
“You have to be focused, you have to build a team. It has to be a team that can argue, including argue with the president […] but at the end of the day we all row in the same direction,” Kasich told Tapper on Sunday.
Kasich added that such infighting in the White House is concerning, and they need to “settle it down.”
“If you’re not going to go along with the leader, then you have to leave,” he added. “They got to get some stability among the staff, and I think that’s probably what [Chief of Staff John] Kelly is trying to do.”
.@JohnKasich: “The problem you have is when you have chaos among your staffits hard to get anything done #CNNSOTU https://t.co/szhEb4KY7Y— CNN (@CNN) August 20, 2017
Later in the interview, Kasich was asked if the Republicans should put forth a new candidate in 2020 to challenge Trump. Kasich, who ran for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016, has seen his name float around as a possible candidate in 2020.
Kasich deflected by saying he himself would not run, but rather help be a voice to propel Trump to success.
“I’m rooting for him to get it together, we all are,” he said. “The president is doing to learn from these episodes.”
