Kentucky Republican Representative Thomas Massie released an ad Tuesday questioning his primary opponents’ conservative credentials.
Massie, who has an 83% lifetime score from Heritage Action, pointed out that Ed Gallrein, who is now endorsed by President Donald Trump, changed his voter registration from Republican to Independent in 2016, the year Trump won the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.
“Ed [Gallrein] wants you to believe he is “Republican. Full Stop,” Massie’s campaign wrote on social media. “The truth: He abandoned President Trump and left the Republican Party in disgust just days after @realdonaldtrump won the nomination in 2016.”
Massie also accused Gallrein of “pushing the woke agenda,” and of “betraying Trump and the GOP.”
“Woke Ed Gallrein abandoned President Trump’s Republican Party, a dereliction of his MAGA duty,” the ad states, branding Gallrein as “a Trump traitor.”
The ad also points out that Gallrein changed his voter registration back to Republican in 2021, before he ran for Kentucky’s state Senate in 2024.
Gallrein’s campaign responded by pointing fingers at Massie, responding to the ad in a statement first reported by the Courier Journal.
The candidate, a former Navy SEAL, “briefly changed registration out of frustration with the broken system Congressman Massie created in his district, which hurt the Republican Party.”
“He is proud to stand with President Trump and true conservative Republicans,” the campaign added.
Trump first endorsed Gallrein in January, after Massie, whom Trump had endorsed in 2022, began alleging that the president was suppressing the release of files related to convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein. Massie also opposed the administration’s actions against drug cartels and the Iranian regime.
“I am asking all MAGA Warriors to rally behind Captain Ed Gallrein, the Candidate who is, far and away, best positioned to DEFEAT Third Rate Congressman Thomas Massie, a Weak and Pathetic RINO from the beautiful Commonwealth of Kentucky,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“A Brave Combat Veteran, Ed knows the Wisdom and Courage required to Defend our Country, Support our Military/Veterans, and Ensure PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH,” Trump added.
Other former elected officials who recently severed ties with the president, such as Former Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, applauded Massie’s ad. She stated that “Trump is going to KY to endorse a true Never Trumper.”
During a rally in Massie’s congressional district on Wednesday, Trump urged “all MAGA warriors” to “get rid” of “loser” Massie.
“This guy is bad. He’s disloyal to the Republican Party, he’s disloyal to the people of Kentucky, and, most importantly, he is disloyal to the United States of America,” Trump added. He called Massie “a total disaster as a congressman, and frankly, a human being.”
Gallrein, who then took the stage at the rally, promised attendees that he “will serve.”
“I commit to you as I stand here today, that I will stand shoulder to shoulder with President Trump, courageously with our Republican Party to enact the agenda we voted for and fight the Democrats and their sympathizers like Thomas Massie who seek to undermine him and destroy our nation,” the candidate added.
