At the heart of the matter is Matthew 25, the Bible passage Kasich has sometimes cited for his approach to social welfare policy, and particularly Medicaid expansion. In that chapter, Jesus discussed helping those in need — “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.” Then Jesus said, “As you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.”

Kasich has taken that as his basic text on the issue of Medicaid expansion and other aid programs. “Just read Matthew 25,” he said on Fox News in January. “Did you feed the hungry? Did you clothe the naked? If we’re doing things like that, to me that is conservatism.”

“You know, Matthew 25 says that it’s about how you treat the widowed, how you treat the poor, how you treat the hungry, how do you clothe those who have no clothes,” Kasich said on CNN in February. “That is a conservative position to help them get on their feet so they then can assume their rightful place in our society.”

Kasich believes what he believes so strongly that he can sometimes be a bit confrontational about it.