Trump-Backed Candidate Unseats Massie in $33 Million Primary House Race

Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, a far right Republican who has opposed a number of Trump administration initiatives, lost his primary election bid on Tuesday night to a candidate personally endorsed and promoted by President Donald Trump.

Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL and farmer, won the Kentucky race with around 54.9 percent of the vote. Massie, meanwhile, garnered 45.1 percent of support from Republican voters in his district.

The race drew national attention because of Trump’s intense targeting of Massie. The president’s ire was prompted by the congressman’s votes in favor of war powers restrictions on his war in Iran, as well as Massie’s insistence on the full release of files relating to alleged child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, with whom Trump once had a close friendship.

The primary race is likely one of the most expensive in U.S. history. Between the two candidates (and super PACs involved in the race), around $33 million was spent on political advertising, the highest amount ever recorded for a primary race by AdImpact, a firm that has measured political spending in such races since 2018.

In addition to Trump-aligned groups spending huge amounts in the race, several pro-Israel organizations, including some with ties to AIPAC, spent millions of dollars in favor of Gallrein and opposed to Massie, as the latter candidate has been a frequent critic of Israel. In total, Trump- and Israel-aligned groups spent around $19 million in ads for Gallrein and against Massie.

The primary race was also notable for including AI-generated ads against each candidate, featuring fictionalized versions of both Gallrein and Massie acting in ways that conservative voters would dislike. The AI ad against Massie, for example, portrayed him holding hands with Democratic Reps. Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, while the anti-Gallrein AI-generated ad showed him abandoning Trump on a battlefield, pointing to Gallrein’s anti-Trump actions in years past.

In total, at least $1.7 million was spent collectively by both sides on the deepfake advertisements.

Massie’s anti-Trump votes and positions were the main focus of the primary election campaign. The Kentucky Republican joined with Democrats in the House on multiple occasions to vote in favor of a War Powers Act resolution that would have forced Trump to end the war in Iran. Massie also co-sponsored the Epstein Files Transparency Act with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-California), legislation that Trump initially vehemently opposed before reluctantly endorsing it when it became clear that Congress would likely approve the measure. (The Trump administration has since failed to comply with the law on several occasions, which Massie has pointed out.)

However, most of Massie’s positions have been starkly far right. He regularly defied the House requirement to wear a mask during the COVID pandemic, and compared vaccine mandates that many states had adopted to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. Massie also shared images of his family’s Christmas card, showing them holding guns and asking for Santa to “bring ammo,” days after a school mass shooting in late 2021.

Massie’s anti-LGBTQ positions are also notable. He has expressed the belief, contradictory to the Constitution’s framework, that federal protections for marriage equality should be superseded by state definitions of marriage. He also opposes defining sexual orientation and gender identity as protected social classes, errantly complaining that doing so would be religious discrimination akin to Jim Crow laws legalizing racial segregation.

Massie’s homophobia and transphobia were apparent up to the end of his primary election campaign. On Monday, he shared a video of himself on social media playing music alongside right-wing activist David Reilly, who organized a “Heterosexual Awesomeness” rally in Idaho last year. (In addition to his attacks on the LGBTQ community, Reilly also harbors racist and antisemitic views.) Massie’s campaign also released an ad accusing Gallrein of being “bought and paid for by the LGBTQ Mafia.”

Gallrein now advances to the general election, where he faces off against Democratic primary winner Melissa Strange. The district is considered a Republican stronghold by The Cook Political Report.