I don't agree with conservatives on many things, but one area we can all agree: John Kasich really is an asshole.
One of the biggest successes this election cycle has been John Kasich's scheme to convince people that a) he's a moderate and b) he's a nice guy. To be fair, in a GOP race that has the frontrunners trying to out-hate and out-asshole the other, it probably wasn't that hard to do.
But it's not real.
Not only is John Kasich not at all moderate, he has real issues. Politico has documented many instances of his volatile temper. Although NBC News uses the word “cranky," most other outlets, like Cleveland.com, prefer the term "jerk”. That is the word those closest to him tend to use.
I have another term for him that perhaps you can guess when you hear this story. When he was first elected, Kasich told the media he had to pick an all white cabinet because he said he couldn't find any qualified diverse candidates. When a black Ohio legislator offered assistance, he told her bluntly, "I don't need YOUR PEOPLE!"
(To be clear, that's not something nice people say.)
So it's no surprise that Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. hit the roof when he heard Kasich disparaging an officer for giving him a ticket that he clearly deserved. He posted a damning video that is now making the rounds. It shows a 2008 police dashcam video of Kasich zooming past a police car on Ohio's Route 315 while it's emergency lights are clearly activated. (In 2008, Kasich was a managing director at Lehman Brother's, right before their collapse.)
Ohio law requires you to move over during an active traffic stop, as all of the other cars that are not being driven by Kasich are shown doing in that video. (Having a law enforcement background, I completely understand this law and wish Florida would adopt one.)
The cop, Officer Robert Barrett, is shown pulling Kasich over and writing him a ticket. You can see on camera that the cop is entirely professional the whole time, while Kasich is entirely argumentative.
Not willing to let well enough alone, and clearly furious that he had an $85 ticket, John Kasich verbally maligned the officer in a speech to Ohio EPA workers where he actually said this.
“Have you ever been stopped by a policeman, who was an idiot? I had this idiot pull me over on 315. Listen to this story. He says to me, you passed this emergency vehicle on the side of the road and you didn’t yield. I didn’t even see, where the heck was it. The last thing I would ever do would be to pass an emergency vehicle. Are you kidding me?”
You can clearly see in the video Kasich zooming past the cop car at the 1:09 minute mark. His rant continued...
“...tells me if you don’t report to court, we are putting a warrant out for your arrest. HE'S AN IDIOT!! We just can’t act that way, and what people resent is people who are in the government, and don't treat the client with respect!"
Along with footage of the incident, Sheriff Clarke tweeted:
This rat bastard @JohnKasich lied about this cop's treatment of him as a lack of respect. Called the cop an idiot.
Below is his speech, along with the dash cam footage of what really happened.