This is part one of a two-part series on the congressmen who defied their parties over the recent funding bill. Part two will focus on Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine), who supported the continuing resolution to fund the government despite opposition from all other House Democrats.
At that juncture, just three months out from Massie’s primary, the president encouraged Republican leaders to kick him out of the GOP. Massie said he sought a recorded vote “to make sure our republic doesn’t die by unanimous consent in an empty chamber.”
State Rep. Steven Doan, one of several Republican state lawmakers tightly aligned with Massie as part of the Kentucky Liberty Caucus, told The Epoch Times that Massie “is the purest of the pure in terms of conservatism.” The president, by contrast, “is a populist.”
“Those two things don’t always go together,” added Doan, who also runs a law firm.
Some in Kentucky’s conservative Fourth District hope to see Massie ousted, though a few of them didn’t want their names in print.
One former state representative said Massie “is absolutely ripe to be challenged and possibly defeated” if the right opponent materializes.
Ed Massey lost his seat in 2022 to Massie ally Steve Rawlings, who is now a state senator. Massey—not to be confused with Massie—lost another bid for the seat in 2024 to a different Liberty Caucus mainstay, attorney and current State Rep. T.J. Roberts.
Claire Wirth, who lost the 2022 GOP primary to Massie, suggested Trump may have learned a lesson from endorsing him in her race.
“I think he was hoping that he could build loyalty with Thomas Massie,” Wirth, now a regional director with the Kentucky Federation of Republican Women, told The Epoch Times. She added that Massie “was never going to support Trump.”
After the latest clash, a serious, Trump-backed primary challenge to Massie could be on the horizon. Insiders frequently mentioned state Rep. Kim Moser and state Sen. Chris McDaniel as possible contenders.
But a trip through Massie’s home turf revealed abiding respect for the man first elected to Congress in 2012.
Previous attempts to primary the Massachusetts Institute of Technology-educated engineer have failed, often by yawning margins. In the 2020 Republican primary, which took place a few months after Trump castigated Massie over his COVID-19 vote, the incumbent claimed 81 percent of the vote to 19 percent for opponent attorney Todd McMurtry.
Roberts told The Epoch Times that the president “needs to fire whoever told him going out for Thomas Massie was a good idea.”
He predicted that Massie’s 2026 opponent would answer to special interests in Washington.
“It won’t be a close race,” Roberts added.
On the Ground in Massie’s District
First elected to Congress in 2012, Massie represents a long strip of northern Kentucky that straddles the Ohio River and includes much of the commonwealth’s outer bluegrass region. “Massie country” stretches from the outskirts of Louisville through the south suburbs of Cincinnati to Lewis and Greenup counties, the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains.
On the ground in the Fourth District, it wasn’t hard to find Kentuckians loyal to their congressman.
Squirrel, who was working the register at a gas station in Walton, Kentucky, told The Epoch Times that he likes Trump a lot but prefers Massie. He described the president as a dealmaker—a man who could get things done—but said Massie is less inclined to sell out his constituents.
Sam Markstein, spokesperson for the Republican Jewish Coalition, said the organization “will be a leading force alongside President Trump in support of a viable candidate to defeat Massie.” The Jewish Insider was the first to report the news.
One Republican volunteer in the district, who did not wish to be named, told The Epoch Times that Massie’s statements on Israel could be “a real vulnerability for someone like him.”
“We’re very evangelical,” the Republican volunteer added.
On the other hand, the incumbent benefited from almost $560,000 from the Protect Freedom PAC, backed by libertarian TikTok investor Jeff Yass and the fiscally conservative Club for Growth.
Outside a grocery store in Garrison, Kentucky, a small community near the river in Lewis County, Doc Wilburn was sweeping up fallen leaves in the parking lot. He pointed in the general direction of the Massie off-grid homestead a few miles down the road. Massie, whose late wife also attended MIT, runs his house on a repurposed Tesla Model S battery.
“Everybody knows him. He’s really nice,” Wilburn told The Epoch Times.
Twenty-five miles west of Garrison, at Kehoe’s Dixie Café in Tollesboro, Kentucky, most of the men lunching at what a sign identified as the “Liars Table” told The Epoch Times they like Massie, though a few noted he hadn’t been around Tollesboro in a while. The one man who had significant reservations about the congressman did not wish to share his name.
Danny Hornback said he agrees with Massie’s efforts to avoid increasing the deficit.
Alan Bane sat across from Hornback, who called him: “My best basketball coach in high school, and the best teacher.”
Bane supports Massie but also backs aid for Israel, which he was not aware Massie opposed. The congressman’s fiscal concerns motivate his opposition to all foreign aid, including aid to Israel.
On the other side of the district, Oldham County GOP chair Blaine Anderson sat at the One Nineteen West Main Restaurant in La Grange, Kentucky. The hospitality industry retiree who drives buses for the local school district, told The Epoch Times why he trusts Massie.
Anderson said the lawmaker will explain the reasoning behind his sometimes-controversial decisions in Congress, including his opposition to funding Israel’s Iron Dome.
“He can defend his votes,” Anderson said, adding that Massie reveals how special interests influence key committees during Lincoln Day dinners with local Republicans.
While the Tollesboro locals said Massie had not visited their community in a while, Jason Kinser, the owner of One Nineteen West Main and a La Grange city council member, recalled spotting Massie in his restaurant.
“His favorite dish here is pork chops,” Kinser said.
Kinser and Anderson stressed their respect for Massie’s integrity, with Kinser adding that he appreciates Trump’s deal making ability.
The restaurateur said Massie’s no vote on the continuing resolution “definitely would not deter me from voting for him again.”
Lisa Fields, a server at the restaurant, weighed in on Massie, too.
“I disagree with him a lot, but I love how he throws the wrench in the works and makes everybody stop for a second,” she said. “He’s the one who questions the teacher.”
Fields, a registered Democrat, said that some of Trump’s moves make her nervous but she is confident that by the end of the administration, “it’s going to end up great.”
Midway between La Grange and Tollesboro, in Covington, Kentucky, Shane Noem chairs the Kenton County Republican Party. Noem, a Republican lobbyist with Roebling Solutions, spoke with The Epoch Times in his office, which overlooks the Ohio River. The skyscrapers of downtown Cincinnati gleamed on the other side.
“It’s the economic engine, frankly, for the state,” Noem said of the Kentucky region for which he lobbies, which includes neighboring Boone and Campbell Counties.
Noem said Massie “has his own unique brand, a brand that is controversial, but also a breath of fresh air to some.”
He wondered how the congressman will handle his public conflict with Trump, now the unchallenged leader of the national Republican Party.
“Voters have rewarded him with reelection time and time again,” Noem said of Massie.
Massie, the GOP
While Massie’s allies and supporters see him as a paragon of integrity, not beholden to party pressures, local GOP critics say that independence has its downsides.
“He kind of has a disdain for the party, frankly,” the Republican volunteer said, telling The Epoch Times that Massie’s ground game is lacking beyond a cadre of libertarian-leaning loyalists.
“It makes it challenging to lock arms with him and go fight with him when he doesn’t want to lock arms with you and help grow the party locally.”
Doan, the state representative and Massie ally, said he wasn’t sure if Massie lacked that kind of ground game for the wider party.
“Thomas certainly has recruited candidates and worked with candidates that knocked [on] doors,” he said. “We’re the face of the liberty movement to the everyday guy.”
The Republican volunteer said that a serious contender against Massie would have to be “someone with business cred, someone polished, and someone that can raise a lot of money or appeal to these groups that have an axe to grind.”
In addition to close Trump allies and pro-Israel groups, those foes could include some local business stakeholders.
Massey said the ideal candidate against Masie would be someone who “can work with others.”
Like Roberts, Doan doesn’t think Massie will face a significant opponent in 2026.
“It’d be a fool’s errand to even consider it,” he said.
The Epoch Times reached out to local Democrats and independents, none of whom responded by press time.
Jackson Richman contributed to this report.
