Gov. John Kasich, R-Ohio, an oft-critic of President Donald Trump, turned his ire to the establishment in Washington — both Democrats and Republicans — in not being able to work together, calling the lack of partisan support for anything "pathetic."
"That's pathetic," Kasich told Sunday's "State of the Union" on Sunday, responding to CNN host Dana Bash's assertion Democrats refuse to work with the White House on anything right now. "It's not old days anymore. If you don't have the old days back from the standpoint of people are Americans before they are Republicans and Democrats, nothing will get done!
"And if the the Democrats don't want to reach out and be constructive, then call them on it — talk about the fact that they won't help — because many of them will if it's put to them."
Democrats reportedly would not cast a single vote on the American Health Care Act, which saw its vote pulled in the House on Friday by President Trump.
"Look, the exchanges in Obamacare are disintegrating," Kasich told CNN. "This is not a situation that is going to do anything other than leave people who are vulnerable in a very bad position, so this is a time for America to stand up, and I understand that Donald Trump has said maybe we should have done this more with Democrats."
Regardless if the AHCA had been passed this week, it would have ultimately failed — like Obamacare — because it did not have support from both sides of the aisle, Kasich said.
"Right now, off the get go, it's all partisan," he added to Bash. "The Democrats did it with Obamacare, and it's not sustainable, and the Republicans tried to do it with just Republicans.
"It doesn't work like that in our country. We're not at parliamentary system, and whenever you continue to operate like that what you pass will never be sustainable.
"And the people of this country, particularly the vulnerable, the mentally ill, the drug-addicted and chronically ill who will pay the price for politics. It needs to stop!"
Kasich called Washington "broken" and Republicans need to find middle ground to move legislation.
"Look, if you're on the extreme — whether you're on the right or whether you're on the left — you ought to be marginalized," he told Bash. "And that's what happens when you bring reasonable Republicans with reasonable Democrats together, and then you begin to see the extremes start to move a little bit to be more constructive."
Kasich does not want healthcare reform to die right now over partisan politics.
"This cannot go away, Dana, because there are too many people's lives that are at stake if we fail to be able to reform this program," he concluded. "This is serious, serious stuff, and the idea that it's a quaint notion that Republicans and Democrats ought to work together, that's how broken that city is. That is how broken.
"Maybe what the president needs to do is he needs to call everybody out and say, 'Let's grow up and let's serve America.'"
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.