AP Interview: Ohio's Kasich enthuses over Davos

DAVOS, Switzer­land (AP) — Embark­ing on what he called a reluc­tant trade mis­sion, Ohio Gov­er­nor John Kasich said Fri­day that his state’s eco­nomic come­back was gen­er­at­ing inter­est — and poten­tial new busi­ness oppor­tu­ni­ties — on the world stage in Switzerland.

Ohio’s blue-collar vot­ers have made it arguably the most impor­tant swing state in recent U.S. pres­i­den­tial elec­tions, and Pres­i­dent Barack Obama won the state in Novem­ber by focus­ing on the con­tro­ver­sial auto indus­try bailout. Kasich, who explored a pres­i­den­tial bid in the run-up to the 2000 elec­tion, also con­firmed he would seek re-election in 2014.

The Repub­li­can gov­er­nor, a for­mer con­gress­man who rose to House Bud­get Com­mit­tee chair­man before work­ing as a Lehman Broth­ers invest­ment banker and com­men­ta­tor on Fox News Chan­nel, told The Asso­ci­ated Press that he was ini­tially “very reluc­tant” to make the trip to the annual World Eco­nomic Forum in Davos.

He decided to go, he said, after he real­ized that this week’s gath­er­ing offered a valu­able chance to court busi­ness and pro­vide a global per­spec­tive. Davos is awash with top busi­ness lead­ers from around the world as well as many other high-profile peo­ple from the worlds of pol­i­tics, aca­d­e­mics and commerce.

“It’s like a trade mis­sion in one small lit­tle area,” he said. “We focused almost exclu­sively on CEOs.”

Kasich was involved in a num­ber of panel dis­cus­sions and held pri­vate meet­ings with about 15 exec­u­tives from big com­pa­nies to pitch ideas on invest­ing in Ohio.

“The thing that I have been sur­prised by is that the peo­ple around have heard that things are get­ting bet­ter in Ohio,” he said. “I’ve been shocked.”

When talk­ing with inter­na­tional lead­ers, Kasich said he empha­sizes his will­ing­ness to work closely with busi­ness — a fact he cred­its for help­ing turn Ohio’s $8 bil­lion bud­get deficit into what he says will be a $1 bil­lion surplus.

Among those he held busi­ness dis­cus­sions were U.S.-based Dow Chem­i­cal Co. and Philips Health­care, which announced thou­sands of lay­offs last year and is a part of Netherlands-based Royal Philips Electronics.

His mes­sage: “We’re open for busi­ness .… If you’ve got a big idea, come to Ohio.”

Posted by Matt Echelberry on Jan 25 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.