Ohio Gov. John Kasich found himself in familiar territory Monday campaigning in New Hampshire. The candidate however whose support he asked voters for was not himself but Chris Sununu who is a Republican hopeful for governor.
Sununu is the son of the state's former Governor John Sununu and the younger brother of the national chair of Kasich's presidential bid former U.S. Senator John Sununu.
"He's playing the inside game," said WEWS Political Analyst Tom Sutton. "He's collecting chips, people who supported him, he's now providing support for them."
Support he will need should he decide to run for president again in 2020 if Donald Trump loses to Hillary Clinton this fall.
"He's keeping some of his staff on from the campaign so that he can quietly build a network and continue that network going into 2020," said Sutton.
Last month Newsnet5 asked Kasich if he would consider another run. "Well that's like asking somebody once they finish a marathon, you know meet them at the finish line and say are you going to run another one," Kasich said. "I'm not shutting my political operation down, I'm not going to close any doors, I'm not making any final decisions."
Kasich still has two years in office and with op-ed's the last two weeks in the New York Times and Forbes it's clear that he wants to make sure those two years provide him with a launching off point.
"This idea of the economic model of Ohio, the social model of Ohio being what he would support and want to see happen nationally. This harkens back to people like Franklin Delano Roosevelt when he was governor of New York, a lot of what he did as governor was what he proposed he would do as president."
"He has the potential to do that in particulary because we're not just talking about Trump as a candidate winning or losing, we're talking about the continued effort by the Republican party to reshape itself to on the one hand appeal to conservative principles but also a party that can win national elections and they have not been able to do that. He's trying to offer that alternative say I can give you both," Sutton said.
For his part Kasich said in July his fourth quarter as governor will be "very aggressive."
"What we're going to try to do is bring all the technology of this 21st century into the operation of the government, we're going to think about everything differently as much as we can," Kasich said. "My goal is to get everyone to open their minds and to think about things differently."
It's also to give people the encouragement to know that they've got just over two years left, "make your mark."
"We are not going to finish this like some lame duck little whining, whimpering, little I'm going out. We're going to drive this as best we can for change for Ohio," he said.
