By Patrick O'Connor 

LAS VEGAS--Three prominent Republican governors eying potential White House bids in 2016 made the case Saturday for the U.S. to play an outsize role on the world stage.

In an early audition for some of the GOP's most prominent donors, Govs. Chris Christie of New Jersey, John Kasich of Ohio and Scott Walker of Wisconsin endorsed the party's traditionally hawkish view of a strong national defense.

"When America does not play an active, vigorous role in the world, bad people do," Mr. Christie told about 400 members of the Republican Jewish Coalition here at the Venetian Hotel Resort Casino.

That argument drew spirited applause from a group that advocates strong support for Israel and a robust American military footprint overseas, but it comes at a time when polling shows that most Americans want a cautious approach to foreign military engagements.

The Republicans argued that President Barack Obama has undermined American standing abroad by sending mixed signals in one foreign conflict after another, among them the civil war in Syria and Russian President Vladimir Putin's recent move to annex Crimea.

"If people around the world--not just our allies but adversaries--don't believe that we're strong, they will take action," Mr. Walker said.

In remarks here, the Republicans mixed the personal with the political as each delivered variations of their standard stump speech to a crowd that included billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, chairman of Las Vegas Sands Corp., who shelled out an estimated $92 million in political contributions in the 2012 election.

Mr. Christie said it was time for Republicans "as a party to stop killing each other," referring to the quarreling between conservative activists and party leaders in Washington that resulted in a partial shutdown of the federal government last year.

"I'm not in this business to have an academic conversation," Mr. Christie said. "I am in this business to win elections."

All three governors stressed the need to expand the GOP's appeal beyond the crusade for fiscal restraint that has defined the Republican Party since Mr. Obama became president.

"We can't be the party of less," Mr. Walker said. "We can't be the accountant party, with all due respect to the accountants here. We can't be the party that's about cutting things and taking things away."

The Wisconsin governor, while making a public point of brushing aside any speculation about 2016, also made the case that the next Republican presidential nominee should be a governor or someone who doesn't serve in Congress.

"The other party's nominee is going to be someone who is in and of Washington," Mr. Walker said. "We need to send people from outside Washington."

For Mr. Christie, the stop in Las Vegas comes as the New Jersey governor works to recover from a scandal that continues to weigh on his White House ambitions. He fielded a question about the controversy over the manufactured traffic jam last year in Fort Lee, N.J., telling the crowd he needs to be more vigilant about questioning the motives of people who serve in his administration.

"I am going to be responsible for all that happens on my watch," he told the crowd.

A report released this week initiated by Mr. Christie largely exonerated the Republican governor.

Much of the conversation here centered on the debate inside the GOP about whether to subject the Pentagon budget to the same fiscal austerity imposed on other agencies and federal programs, and whether the U.S. should preserve its role enforcing stability abroad. Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.), a potential presidential candidate, in particular has said conservatives should back scaled-down military spending.

"Unfortunately, we see in our own party a rising tide of what can only be viewed as isolation," former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton told the crowd. "I am worried about the rise of neo-isolationism in the Republican Party."

Write to Patrick O'Connor at patrick.oconnor@wsj.com

Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires

Las Vegas Sands (NYSE:LVS)
Historical Stock Chart
From Feb 2024 to Mar 2024 Click Here for more Las Vegas Sands Charts.
Las Vegas Sands (NYSE:LVS)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2023 to Mar 2024 Click Here for more Las Vegas Sands Charts.