Rep. Thomas Massie’s (R-KY) fight for political survival is bleeding into Kentucky’s Senate race after two of the Republican contenders endorsed his challenger to curry favor with President Donald Trump.
Rep. Andy Barr (R-KY) and entrepreneur Nate Morris endorsed Ed Gallrein in quick succession on Thursday, leaving former Attorney General Daniel Cameron as the only major candidate to stay on the sidelines in Massie’s race.
Massie, a libertarian and six-term House member, has embraced his status as a pariah in Trumpworld, owing to his opposition to the president’s tax law and role in forcing the release of the Epstein files.
But Republicans, especially those seeking Trump’s endorsement, want nothing to do with his candidacy and see Gallrein’s entry into the race at Trump’s urging as an opportunity to signal their loyalty to the president.
In announcing the endorsement, Barr’s campaign said he would be hosting a meet-and-greet with Gallrein in Kentucky next Friday and dubbed Morris as “Late Nate” for offering his endorsement later the same afternoon.
Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL and state Senate candidate, touted their backing as a sign that “MAGA conservatives” are uniting behind him.
The endorsements mark the latest wrinkle in what has become a bitter race to succeed retiring Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY). Early on, that meant distancing themselves from McConnell, himself a foe of the president, and promising to be a reliable Trump defender in Congress.
Yet all three candidates have since turned to other Trump critics to cement their standing with the White House.
In this latest dust-up, Barr and Morris are pointing to donations the other gave to Massie in past election cycles. Morris, a Lexington businessman, donated to Massie in 2020 and 2022, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Barr, meanwhile, made a donation in 2020 through his leadership PAC.
(Trump first called for Massie to be “thrown out” of the GOP in 2020, but later endorsed him in 2022.)
The falling out between Trump and former Rep. Liz Cheney is another feud shaping the campaign, with Morris citing donations Barr gave through his leadership PAC to Cheney and three other House Republicans who voted to impeach the president in 2021.
Barr, in turn, notes that Morris donated to former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley two years before she challenged Trump for the presidential nomination.
“Those guys endorsing Woke Eddie isn’t about my race. It’s about their campaigns,” Massie told the Washington Examiner in a statement.
The Cameron campaign did not respond to a request for comment, but his team has largely stayed out of the mud-slinging between Morris and Barr as they seek to overtake him in polling. Until recently, Cameron had a comfortable lead over both competitors, but two independent polls released this week showed them siphoning off support, with Cameron now in a close second and Morris roughly 10 points behind.
A Trump endorsement could fundamentally reshape the race, given he won the state by a whopping 30 points in 2024. One poll from Quantus Insights found that almost half of Republican primary voters would be more likely to support a candidate who gets Trump’s backing. A large percentage of voters are also still undecided.
For that reason, each candidate is not simply trying to signal their MAGA bona fides to Kentucky’s voting electorate. They are appealing to Trump himself in the hope that he wades into the race, or at least decides not to back a challenger.
“I don’t think that these guys endorsing Massie’s challenger is really aimed at Kentucky politics,” said John Feehery, a Republican strategist. “It’s probably more aimed at the White House.”
“I think that Trump has two things that he cares about – No. 1, are you loyal to him? And No. 2, can you win?” Feehery added.
Cameron lost a 2023 bid for governor to Democrat Andy Beshear despite a Trump endorsement and has struggled to keep up with fundraising in his Senate race. But his strong polling position is due in part to his name ID in the state and endorsements from a number of Kentucky officials.
Of the candidates, Barr has the largest campaign war chest and the backing of several House members aligned with the president, including former White House physician Ronny Jackson (R-TX), Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA), and Elise Stefanik (R-NY), the chairwoman of House Republican leadership.
But Morris is newly touting a $10 million cash infusion from tech mogul Elon Musk and has steadily pumped his own wealth into the campaign. In addition to Musk, Morris has endorsements from the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, multiple Trump-aligned senators, and former White House strategist Steve Bannon.
Trump is not the only litmus test on the ballot. Morris is attempting to make the border a mainstay of his campaign, advocating a freeze on immigration until everyone in the country illegally is deported.
All three are also painting one another as too “woke” for Kentucky, a message that has seeped into Massie’s race as well.
In a new ad, Massie claimed that Gallrein supports a “comeback” for diversity initiatives after “Trump crushed the woke agenda.” The ad, which flashes Trump on the screen, suggests that Massie understands the president’s sway in the state, even as he bucks him on Capitol Hill.
Just this past week, Trump called Massie a “moron” at a prayer breakfast in Washington, prompting Massie to accuse him of being upset because “I’m still fighting for what he promised the American people.”
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The two have had an on-and-off-again relationship for years, with Massie notoriously holding up pandemic-era spending over Trump’s objections during his first term as president.
The latest break has become a boon for Massie in terms of fundraising, but he is facing a deluge of spending from a Trump-aligned PAC supporting Gallrein.
