By McKenna Horsley
Kentucky Lantern
Even though he’s become a thorn in President Donald Trump’s side, Kentucky Republican U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie appears to still have an enthusiastic base of supporters in his congressional district.
Massie earned laughs and applause from a large crowd at a rally in Burlington Wednesday night. It was the final stop of the day for him and Republican Kentucky U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, who travelled throughout Northern Kentucky for a mix of official forums and campaign events.
Perhaps the clearest sign that Massie is still in good graces with his constituents is the standing ovation he received after announcing he will have the 218 signatures needed to force a U.S. House vote on releasing federal investigation files on convicted sex offender and financier Jeffery Epstein, a point he reiterated throughout Wednesday’s stops. Though the president campaigned on declassifying the files, Trump has more recently opposed releasing them.
Amid the president’s repeated threats to oust the seven-term congressman, next year’s GOP primary for Massie’s seat could become a choice between Trump’s brand of governing and the Tea Party movement that helped propel Massie and Paul into office, though no Trump-backed challenger has stepped up.
A Trump-tied super PAC, MAGA KY, spent $1.2 million on ads opposing Massie this summer. The congressman has previously accused one of the PAC’s backers, financier John Paulson, of being in Epstein’s “black book,” and did so again during the rally. A spokesperson for Paulson has denied this and called it “a weak attempt to imply a relationship with Epstein” that doesn’t exist, according to media reports.
“I do find it interesting that I am leading the charge to release these files, and that one of the three billionaires is among the circle of just a few hundred people who are actually in the phone book of Jeffrey Epstein,” Massie told the crowd.
Massie has been trying to convince his colleagues in the U.S. House to sign a discharge petition to force a floor vote on the U.S. Department of Justice releasing files on Epstein. The government’s investigation into Epstein’s widespread sexual abuse has dogged and splintered House Republicans since July, when Trump’s administration declared it would not share any further information on the powerful and well-connected financier.
At the rally, Massie was also critical of the PAC ads against him, including one that accused him of supporting burning U.S. flags. He said that he once tweeted that he agreed with late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia “that if you have your own flag and you’re on your own property and you’re not infringing on somebody else’s rights, you can burn your flag.”
“Now, if you burn my flag, I’m going to kick your ass,” Massie said, and the crowd roared with cheers.
Massie has often been seen as a leader of Liberty Republicans in Northern Kentucky, or GOP politicians who lean more libertarian than the rest of the party. With constituents during stops, he focused on his priorities like eliminating national debt, supporting limited government and not backing foreign aid.
Like Paul, the son of former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul from Texas who led the Tea Party movement, Massie has not been afraid to rub his fellow Republicans the wrong way by opposing budget bills that he considers irresponsible. Speaking ahead of Massie, the senator said he and Massie sometimes incur anger, even from Trump, “because we vote on principle.”
“You have to treat presidents the same. No matter which party they’re in. We have to believe in something bigger than me, bigger than Thomas and, frankly, bigger than Donald Trump,” Paul said.
Paul said Massie’s upcoming Republican primary in the 4th Congressional District in May will be one of the “biggest elections in U.S. history” because “if they defeat him, they’re defeating all of us.”
“If Thomas loses, if they have the ability to have three billionaires come down here from New York City and beat him, they defeat the movement,” Paul told the crowd. “It is the end of the Tea Party at that point.”
‘Under Trump’s skin’
Earlier this year, Massie opposed Trump’s bombing of Iran. He voted against the president’s tax and spending plan, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, for increasing federal deficits and the debt. Trump took to Truth Social in June calling Massie a “simple minded ‘grandstander’” and said he “votes ‘NO’ on virtually everything put before him (Rand Paul, Jr.), no matter how good something may be.”
Trump vowed to oust Massie with “a wonderful American Patriot running against him in the Republican Primary.” Massie, an MIT-educated engineer who served as Lewis County judge-executive, was elected to Congress in 2012.
During the rally, Paul said he was ready to endorse Massie and if someone asked about waiting to see who could run against the congressman, “I can’t imagine that they’d even try it.”
Northern Kentuckian Trey Grayson, a former Republican secretary of state who lost the 2010 U.S. Senate primary to Paul, told the Lantern in a phone interview that traveling the district with an ally like Paul is a way for Massie to be “visible” and “remind people who he is” ahead of the primary.
“He’s very personable, and so getting out and about in the district, reminding people of that fact, and also talking about what’s been going on. He’s talking about the Epstein files and talking about his votes and defending his record. So, I think it’s pretty smart politics to do that and especially right now.”
Wednesday’s stops included rural parts of the congressional district, including forums in eastern counties Greenup and Mason. Massie and Paul connected with the Republican base in Northern Kentucky in Burlington and in Dry Ridge at Beans Cafe and Bakery. The cafe pushed back against restrictions on bars and restaurants during the coronavirus pandemic, gaining support from local conservatives.
Massie repeated the central points of his messaging throughout the day — strong support of the First and Second Amendments, a love of agriculture, and concerns about a growing national debt. He drew attention to his real-time debt counter, which he had pinned to his jacket for the day and often wears at the U.S. Capitol, by joking that some Democrats ask if it’s his step counter.
Grayson said Massie “is pretty formidable” in the congressional district. Pushing an issue like releasing the Epstein files could keep Massie “under Trump’s skin” and could still motivate Trump’s political team to recruit a primary opponent.
“But at the same time, it’s also one of those issues that maybe when it’s litigated at a ballot box, it’s actually better for Massie, because he’s on the side of transparency and doing something the public likes,” Grayson said.
Grayson said he has heard from some Northern Kentucky Republicans who are “old school” and aren’t big fans of either Trump or Massie, but “several of them have said to me that they like Massie standing up to Trump.”
Asked if he thought pushing for the release of the Epstein files would impact his reelection, Massie told reporters at one stop he’s seen polling that shows “80% of Republicans and Democrats want the Epstein files released, and the other 20% don’t care.”
“There is nobody against transparency, except for the folks in Washington D.C., who are taking up for their billionaire friends and politically connected people,” Massie said. “And I think this is about a trust issue. We need to restore trust in the DOJ (U.S. Department of Justice) and in the government, and they need to release the files.”
Later in the day, Massie told the Burlington rally that he does still have praise for the president despite their policy disagreements. Massie even did an impression of Trump while reenacting a phone call between the two of them about Massie’s endorsement in the 2024 presidential election. He added that his presidential impression maybe “wasn’t that good,” but he had still “never disparaged him personally.”
However, the congressman did warn voters in Burlington that the PAC is going to try to convince them that he isn’t a true conservative and a challenger would have to “sell a lie.”
“They have to try to convince tens of thousands of people in Kentucky that I’m not conservative,” Massie said.
This story is from The Kentucky Lantern, a member of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization. It is reprinted her through Creative Commons license.