Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Friday vowed to back his colleague in the lower chamber, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), throughout a contentious primary challenge in their home state.
Last week, President Trump endorsed Ed Gallrein to unseat Massie in Kentucky’s 2026 GOP primary after Massie initiated a bipartisan resolution to unseal files tied to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and bucked the party by not backing a summer spending package.
Paul said he will continue to support Massie’s push for reelection in spite of tensions with the White House.
“Thomas Massie is going to win,” he said during a Friday interview with Politico’s Dasha Burns for “The Conversation.”
“I’m going to help him. I’m going to be with him every step of the way,” he added.
Paul is no stranger to Trump’s ire and was subjected to insults from the president in a Truth Social post earlier this week.
“The irony is that both myself and Thomas Massie, in many ways, support the president’s agenda significantly more than the people who have gotten close to him,” Paul told Burns.
“The people who’ve gotten close to him, who want regime change in Venezuela and want to send more advanced weaponry to Ukraine, those are the interventionists from the interventionist wing of the party have never been the ones really closely alive. These are the people who have always opposed Donald Trump,” he added.
Paul said he and Massie will continue to advocate for “enumerated powers” in addition to “balanced budgets, low taxes and less foreign war.”
The Kentucky senator campaigned with his colleague last month and said he plans to do so again soon.
“We had big rallies and great deal of support. So people think they can waltz into Kentucky with a bunch of New York money and buy a seat. They’ve got another thing coming,” Paul told Burns.
