Of course, Thomas Massie pretends to be surprised to see the international press interested in it. In reality, he is very aware of the issues. A true free electron, this notorious isolationist, supporter of the smallest state and a drastic reduction in public spending who wears a mini-debt meter on his jacket, is Donald Trump’s main annoyance among Republican parliamentarians. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act”, the flagship law of the billionaire’s second term? He was one of only two Republicans to vote against. The war in Iran? He opposes it. Ditto for American support for Israel.
Above all, he was the co-author, with a Democratic deputy, of the law which forced the Department of Justice to publish the Jeffrey Epstein file, this pedophile to whom Donald Trump was close. A source of embarrassment for the tenant of the White House.
In anger, he commits crimes of lese-majesty, the American president charged him with “loser “and of”clodo“Last March, he came to his land to support his opponent, Ed Gallrein, a farmer and former soldier who has vowed to be in charge if elected to the House of Representatives.
Since then, the election has turned into a real test of Donald Trump’s hold on the party: will he manage to free one of the only parliamentarians who dares to stand up to him? In any case, with more than 25 million dollars spent by both camps, the primary has become the most expensive in the history of Congress. “The momentum is on our side” says Thomas Massie when asked about his chances of success. “This election has become national. People come from all over the country to knock on doors for my candidacy“.
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Ex-entrepreneur in robotics, trained at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the chosen one has a unique profile. Attached to his independence, he lives self-sufficiently on a farm that he built himself at the foot of the Appalachians. After his victory in the House of Representatives in 2012, carried by the wave of the Tea Party, a movement born in response to the increase in state interventionism during the 2009 economic crisis, he quickly stood out by taking the opposite view of his colleagues on several issues. He notably voted against the nomination of Republican John Boehner as “speaker” (president of the chamber). His positions earned the troublemaker the nickname “Mr. No”. Tensions with Donald Trump date back to 2020, when he slowed down the adoption of the CARES Act, a $2.2 trillion stimulus law wanted by the president in the midst of Covid.
Re-elected seven times (in the United States, deputies serve two-year terms), Thomas Massie should have been easily re-elected this year. But the intervention of Donald Trump and PACs (Political Action Committees), these groups with unlimited resources which independently support the candidates, changed the situation. With negative advertisements on the airwaves and screens, they seek to portray the outgoing party as a traitor and a “leftist”. A recent spot generated by artificial intelligence suggests, for example, that he is sleeping with progressive deputies Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, two of the favorite targets of the Trumpist right.
Met in Vanceburg, a small town decorated with posters of former soldiers where Thomas Massie made his debut in politics as a county official, Beth Ranno accuses him of “ be more Democrat than Republican“. The reason: his work with progressive Congressman Ro Khanna on the release of the Epstein dossier. Marc Stefan, a Republican wearing an Ed Gallrein pin, agrees. He voted for Massie several times, but that’s over. “I found his attitude on the Epstein affair disgusting, he says. This story was a maneuver by the Democrats to harm Trump. Mr. Massie got caught up in it“.
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Saturday afternoon, in front of two hundred people gathered in the parking lot of his campaign headquarters in Florence, in the north of the constituency, he boasted of having brought down crowned heads, political leaders and heads of international organizations thanks to the publication of these archives. And to carry out his attacks against Ed Gallrein, whom he accuses of being supported by the influential pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, as well as major donors close to the Jewish state and Jeffrey Epstein.
Aware of representing a very Trumpist constituency, he knows however that his anti-system strategy has limits. So he recalled that he voted “90%” in agreement with the positions of Donald Trump. “We can be for the president and for me“, he assured. A message received five out of five by Vincent Billings, a supporter of Thomas Massie who voted for the billionaire every time he ran. “ I support Trump, but he can be crazy. He needs counter-powers“.
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However, it is clear that the base remains behind its champion, despite the war in Iran. Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, one of the ten Republicans to have voted for the impeachment of Donald Trump after the attack on the Capitol, became on Saturday evening the last elected official critical of the billionaire to have lost his primary. Thomas Massie is warned.
