Joy Behar, a co-host on ABC’s “The View,” on Wednesday lauded Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) for standing up to the Trump administration.
“He’s the one Republican that you can respect right now,” Behar told viewers.
The hosts were discussing Massie’s support for the release of files tied to the late Jeffrey Epstein, a financier by trade who later became a convicted sex offender for internationally trafficking underage girls.
On Wednesday, Massie criticized the GOP party for supporting new legislation related to Washington, D.C., but not advancing the release of documents tied to Epstein’s case.
“Tonight, Congress will vote to lower the age to prosecute minors as adults from 16 down to 14 in DC,” Massie wrote in a Tuesday post on X.
“Let me get this straight: Congress wants to prosecute 14 yr. olds as adults, but they don’t want to prosecute adults who sexually abuse 14 year olds? Release the Epstein files,” he added.
President Trump has criticized Massie, urging another Republican to primary the Kentucky lawmaker.
“Third Rate Congressman Thomas Massie, of the Great Commonwealth of Kentucky, a phenomenal State that I won all three times (by a lot!), keeps talking about how he is going to protect the Constitution, but he is actually very bad for the Constitution, and will probably vote against ‘THE GREAT, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL,’” Trump wrote in a late June post on Truth Social.
Still, Massie has remained openly critical of the president, suggesting that he tone down the rhetoric surrounding political division and other measures after the shooting of Democratic lawmakers and conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“I mean, there is a lot of rhetoric. And the president himself engages in it — he called it a hostile act to co-sponsor the Epstein resolution,” said Massie, who was a leading voice in pushing a motion to force the release of files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. “I think that’s ridiculous rhetoric.”
“It’s amusing,” he added. “It doesn’t offend me that he’s over the top with the rhetoric, but some people take it literally, and he should probably tone that down himself.”
