Poll: Fewer Ohioans want Kasich to stay in race

Just 38 percent want Kasich to stay in the presidential race.

A new poll says Ohio voters are tiring of Gov. John Kasich’s presidential campaign and want him to come home.

Only 38 percent of the respondents to a Public Policy Polling survey want Kasich to stay in the race and 49 percent said they want him to drop out.

The numbers mark a stark contrast to those from early March when 52 percent said he should stay in the race.

Kasich has won just won state — Ohio — since the primary season started and is staying in on the assumption that Donald Trump will not have the necessary 1,237 delegates he needs to sew up the nomination before the Cleveland convention in July.

Kasich has argued that he is the only Republican candidate who can beat Hillary Clinton in November.

One interesting result of the PPP poll is that a higher percentage of Republicans think he should drop out than Democrats.

The poll provides at least a partial reason why: many voters think he is neglecting his job as governor. Forty-nine percent of the respondents — or nearly one in two — think his presidential campaign has caused him to pay insufficient attention to his gubernatorial duties.

In the poll, Kasich is the only Republican in the race who would beat both Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders, though both have cut into his margin.

Donald Trump would narrowly lose to Clinton, according to the poll, but the result is within the poll’s margin of error.

In other findings:

  • 83 percent said they support background checks on all gun purchases;
  • 73 percent said they support increasing the minimum wage to at least $10 an hour; and
  • 66 percent said they would support a bill creating more accountability for charter schools.

The company surveyed 799 registered voters on April 26th and 27th, through a combination of phone and internet interviews. The margin of error is a plus and minus 3.2 percent.

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