Columbia Town Hall allows candidates to show personality

Gov. John Kasich, Gov. Jeb Bush and Donald Trump got to show off their personalities in CNN’s second Republican town hall. This one was at the University of South Carolina School of Law; Wednesday, CNN had a town hall with Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Marco Rubio and Ben Carson in Greenville.

Kasich and Bush, who have often been caught in the bottom half of the polls in South Carolina, got a chance to show off their personalities.

The town hall opened with a clip from Kasich’s town hall at Clemson University earlier that day, when a young man from Georgia told the presidential candidate that Kasich had given him hope for the future after a very difficult year. Kasich told moderator and CNN Anchor Anderson Cooper that encounters like this have not been uncommon during his campaign.

Kasich also discussed the death of his parents, killed by a drunken driver when he was in his 30s, which sent him “into a black hole with a little pin prick of light.” Building himself back up after that loss has helped him reach people on the campaign trail like he did in Clemson on Thursday, he said.

“I’m not — look, I’m not that great a guy, OK? I’m just doing the best I can. And sometimes I fail,” Kasich said. “But I believe there’s a life yet to come, and I just happen to believe that I’m going to look up here and I’m going to do my best to be the best person I can do.”

Bush, whose successful debate performance Saturday has put him in a virtual tie with Cruz and Rubio in some polls, revealed his introverted nature is part of what has kept him going in the race despite some calls for him to quit.

“When you’re running for president and you’re written off over and over again ... you’re just more energized,” Bush said.

Trump, however, was just as blustery in the intimate setting as he is at his campaign rallies. When a Columbia real estate broker asked how he would act rationally as president, he said sometimes you need to be brash to be a strong leader.

“I’d put these people in a room and within 10 minutes we’d have a deal,” Trump said. “I don’t compromise. I always win.”