Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n
A few other legislators who chose to fight on were defeated by Trump-backed opponents<\/a> in Republican primaries.<\/p>\n Congressman Thomas Massie, a Kentucky libertarian, is one of the last dissidents standing. He has been a rare Republican thorn in the side of Trump since the US president\u2019s return to power last year.<\/p>\n Massie has voted against a key tax bill<\/a> backed by the president, pushed for the release of government files related to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein against the White House\u2019s wishes and vocally opposed the war on Iran and US aid to Israel.<\/p>\n Now Massie is in a fight for his career as he faces a Trump-endorsed Republican opponent \u2013 Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL officer \u2013 and an avalanche of pro-Israel spending in next week\u2019s congressional primary in Kentucky.<\/p>\n The contest, however, goes beyond Trump and could be a litmus test for the faultlines emerging within the Republican base, including over military interventions<\/a> and support for Israel.<\/p>\n For Massie\u2019s supporters, the race on May 19 is a test for everything the congressman purports to stand for: unflinching loyalty to the US Constitution, political integrity and standing up to powerful special interest groups.<\/p>\n On Wednesday, influential right-wing commentator Mike Cernovich underscored another aspect of the contest in Kentucky \u2013 a showdown gauging the influence of podcasters who support Massie against campaign spending and traditional conservative media outlets.<\/p>\n \u201cMassie\u2019s primary is an interesting one to watch because it\u2019ll show if podcasters and social media can drive out the vote in a material way. It\u2019s unlimited money on the other end,\u201d Cernovich wrote on X.<\/p>\n \u201cIf Massie loses, every Congress member will be cowed into fear. If he wins, it\u2019s a new media era.\u201d<\/p>\n Who is Massie?<\/p>\n So how did a 55-year-old House member come to represent a political movement at an inflection point in the modern history of US politics?<\/p>\n An engineer and inventor, Massie was born in a town in the Appalachian hills in West Virginia, near Kentucky and Ohio.<\/p>\n He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and then went on to find a company that helped pioneer virtual reality technology and registered dozens of patents.<\/p>\n Massie married his high school sweetheart Rhonda, who died of an illness in 2024, with whom he had four children. The family moved to Kentucky in 2003, and Massie sold his firm to subsequently pursue a career in politics.<\/p>\n He became the judge-executive of Lewis County in 2011 and successfully ran for Congress a year later to represent Kentucky\u2019s 4th District in the house of representatives, a Republican stronghold that encompasses rural areas as well as suburbs of Cincinnati, Ohio.<\/p>\n Massie quickly earned a reputation as a rebel, bucking the bipartisan orthodoxy on foreign policy as well as his own party\u2019s consensus on many issues.<\/p>\n In the first vote of his full term, he joined 11 other Republicans to vote against the election of then-Speaker John Boehner and the only one to back his libertarian colleague Justin Amash to take the gavel.<\/p>\n Willingness to vote against his own party, did not earn Massie many friends on the Democratic side.<\/p>\n In 2021, Massie sparked a huge outcry from Democrats when he posted a Christmas photo<\/a> of himself and his family members holding semi-automatic rifles at a time when gun violence was on the rise.<\/p>\n At times, his uncompromising stances have earned him near universal scorn. In 2022, Massie voted against a bill to make lynching \u2013 the extrajudicial execution of African Americans during racial segregation in the south of the US \u2013 a federal crime<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThis bill expands current federal \u2018hate crime\u2019 laws. A crime is a crime, and all victims deserve equal justice. Adding enhanced penalties for \u2018hate\u2019 tends to endanger other liberties such as freedom of speech,\u201d he wrote in a social media post explaining his vote at that time.<\/p>\n \u201cLynching a person is already illegal in every state. Passing this legislation falsely implies that lynching someone does not already constitute criminal activity.\u201d<\/p>\n Backing a largely symbolic vote against something as despicable as lynching, even if he opposed it, may have been the easier option.<\/p>\n The congressman has said that he has always had that rebellious streak.<\/p>\n \u201cI was simultaneously the teacher\u2019s pet and the teacher\u2019s worst nightmare,\u201d Massie recently told Mother Jones magazine.<\/p>\n \u201cI would like to think I\u2019ve become a lot more tactful, but I still won\u2019t tolerate a wrong answer.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite advocating for gun rights and small government, Massie has been able to team up with Democrats to push forward specific issues, especially opposition to military campaigns abroad.<\/p>\n Most recently, he became a leading figure in the effort to release the Epstein files<\/a>, forging a strong partnership with Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna to pass a bill to compel the Justice Department to make the records public.<\/p>\n Massie has also sided with Democrats in rejecting the war on Iran<\/a>, and he has been one of the few Republican critics of unconditional US military aid to Israel.<\/p>\n Massie\u2019s opponents \u2013 including pro-Israel groups and donors \u2013 are flooding the airwaves with ads against the congressman, often portraying him as not conservative enough and highlighting his vote against the tax bill.<\/p>\n One commercial that aired earlier this month featured deep fake, artificial intelligence-generated footage of Massie holding hands with progressive Democratic congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar<\/a>.<\/p>\n The ad said Massie was caught in a \u201cthrouple\u201d that is \u201cworse than adultery\u201d with the two female legislators.<\/p>\n It was released by a political action committee (PAC) called MAGA KY, whose top donor individual is Paul Singer, a billionaire investor who is also one of the top funders of the election arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).<\/p>\n MAGA KY also received nearly $1m from another group called America 21 PAC, which is also funded by Singer, Federal Election Commission (FEC) records show.<\/p>\n On the Democratic side, dissent over Israel has been growing for years over human rights concerns as Palestinian rights advocates often embraced broader progressive causes.<\/p>\n But Massie has rooted his opposition to military assistance to the US ally in his broader opposition to foreign aid.<\/p>\n![\"Massie](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/AP26042633898437-1778778070.jpg\")
CongressmanThomas Massie questions then-Attorney General Pam Bondi during a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing February 11 [File: Tom Brenner\/AP Photo]Israel and the race<\/p>\n