WASHINGTON — John Kasich, the under-the-radar GOP presidential hopeful, has been suddenly thrust into the national spotlight with a strong second-place finish in New Hampshire.
Few voters know that the Ohio governor and former congressman is a big rock-music fan and was once thrown off the stage of a Grateful Dead concert.
Kasich has campaigned with a conservative, but compassionate message. He touts his spending cuts as former chair of the House Budget Committee, but defends expanding Medicaid under ObamaCare as governor to help the poor.
After Congress, Kasich joined Lehman Brothers’ investment-banking division as managing director and worked there through the financial collapse. He moonlighted on Fox News, too, hosting “From the Heartland with John Kasich” until 2007.
In 1991, he burst onto the pages of the Washington Post for a reason that had nothing to do with politics — he crashed the stage where the Grateful Dead were playing.
Kasich said it wasn’t as raucous as it sounds: he was at Washington’s RFK Memorial Stadium to see opening act Dwight Yoakam, and thought his stage pass would work at the main event.