FAIRFAX, VA (WCMH) — Republican presidential candidate John Kasich says he’s unscripted and will continue operating that way — even if it gets him in trouble.
At an event in Virginia Monday, Kasich raised eyebrows when he said that he first got elected to the state Senate in part by “women who left their kitchens” to campaign for him.
“How did I get elected?” Kasich asked the crowd, recalling his first run for state senate in Ohio in 1978. “Nobody was – I didn’t have anybody for me. We just got an army of people, who, and many women, who left their kitchens to go out and go door to door and to put yard signs up for me. All the way back, when – you know, things were different. Now you call homes, and everybody’s out working. But at that time, early days, it was an army of the women that really helped me get elected to the state Senate.”
Kasich made the comment while speaking to a large crowd at George Mason University. One female student was quick to respond to the governor’s comment.
“Your comment earlier about the women coming out of the kitchen to support you – I’ll come support you, but I won’t be coming out of the kitchen,” she said.
“I gotcha, I gotcha,” Kasich responded.
Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton also responded by Tweeting that a “woman’s place is… wherever she wants it to be.”
Others on social media were also quick to jump on the governor’s comments.
The Ohio governor told reporters in Charlottesville later Monday that women have played a big role in his administration and campaigns.
He said because he doesn’t use a teleprompter or notes, he sometimes doesn’t say things as artfully as he should. Kasich said he’s going to try to be “a bit more careful” but won’t change his ways.
“I’m going to continue to operate on a high wire without a net,” he said. “And frankly, I’d like to see everyone whose running for president get out of the scripted role and start being real and take questions.”
NBC News and the Associated Press contributed to this story.
