Kentucky voters decide the future of Thomas Massie in an unprecedented House race
NEWNow you can listen to Fox News articles!
President Donald Trump on Tuesday scored another victory in his campaign to get revenge on GOP critics, continuing to put his hand on the Republican Party after a flurry of primaries in recent weeks.
Trump-backed Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL and Kentucky farmer, defeated the president’s longtime opponent, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., according to the Associated Press.
Gallrein’s victory represents a major political victory for Trump and allied pro-Israel groups, who have worked hard to unseat the incumbent.
TRUMP POINTS TO MASSIE IN KENTUCKY’S CONTINUING GOVERNMENT AS SIX STATES HOLD SUPERIOR PRIMARIES
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., left, is running for an eighth House term, but Trump-backed GOP challenger Ed Gallrein, right, threatens to derail those plans. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Jeffrey Dean/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Trump let Massie repeat his words in an unusual way in the final days of the primary contest, while expressing his approval of Gallrein, who put him in the race.
The president called Massie, who has consistently opposed parts of his legislative agenda, the “worst member of Congress in history” on Monday.
Gallrein echoed the president’s attacks in an interview with Fox News Digital on Monday.
“My opponent, he’s against President Trump and the agenda that’s been put forward by the Republican Party,” Gallrein said.
But Massie argued that Trump’s support for Gallrein was not an insurmountable challenge because of conservative support for his lunatic politics.
“I have a base here, like my events. I have 100-200, sometimes 300 people,” Massie told Fox News Digital. “My opponent had to cancel events because he couldn’t get enough people, you know, to fill Dairy Queen, part of Dairy Queen.”
“We were able to match them so that we could play with them on television using grassroots sponsors, and it really strengthens the nation,” he continued.
Massie also alleged that Pentagon Secretary Pete Hegseth’s decision to campaign for Gallrein on Monday reflected Trump’s political performance and believed that Massie was “high in the polls.”
“They wouldn’t have sent the Secretary of the Army to my congressional district if I wasn’t,” he added.
Trump also personally campaigned against Massie in his heavily Republican district in March, calling her “disloyal” to the Republican Party and the United States.
TRUMP CALLED REPUBLICAN MASSIE ‘OUT OF LINE’ FOLLOWING CONGRESSMAN’S CRITICISM OF IRAN PROBLEMS.
A libertarian lawyer, Massie was one of the few Republicans to vote against the president’s landmark tax cut and spending bill, citing its impact on the budget deficit. He also helped engineer a legislative effort to force the Justice Department to release the Epstein files over strong opposition from the White House, which later approved the effort.
More recently, Massie has emerged as one of the fiercest Republican critics of Trump’s war on Iran and has repeatedly voted with Democrats to scale back the military campaign.
That policy stance — combined with his votes against military aid to Israel and resolutions condemning religion — drew pro-Trump supporters of Israel into the race to defeat Massie.
“Here’s the thing, I have nothing against Israel. I’ve never voted for foreign aid,” Massie told Fox News Digital. “When I said America First, I meant it. I’m not voting for foreign aid to Egypt, Syria, and Ukraine. I have an impeccable record on this, and I’m not going to waste it by sending foreign aid to one country.”
The Kentucky primary comes on the heels of a series of closely watched GOP primary contests in which Trump’s endorsement power has proven crucial.
Ed Gallrein, a Republican member of Congress from Kentucky, greets U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on stage during a special America First Workers event in Hebron, Ky., May 18, 2026, one day before Kentucky’s primary election. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS PROGRAM
The president celebrated the resignation of five Indiana GOP lawmakers in early May who helped block the state from redrawing its congressional map in favor of Republicans ahead of November’s midterm elections. Another victory for the president came Saturday after Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., was shut out in a runoff election for a third term in the Senate.
The defeated senator voted prominently to impeach Trump following his second impeachment in January 2021.
Massie successfully fended off his primary challengers in 2022 and 2024, though Gallrein posed the biggest challenge to the incumbent since Massie first won House elections in 2012.
The winner is expected to go to the national elections in the red region.
