Republican Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie announced that his campaign raked in over six figures over the past week despite President Donald Trump vowing to back a primary challenge against him.
After facing repeated public criticism from Trump, Massie’s campaign reported Thursday that it raised $177,394 on X — a figure that the campaign said had increased to over $230,000 by Friday. After recently bucking party leadership on Trump’s Iran strike and the president’ sweeping budget bill, Massie has faced immense criticism from the president, but these attacks have only seemed to have mobilized donors who view him as an outsider standing up to pressure.
“Will lobbyists for a FOREIGN country be able to buy a seat in Congress? That’s the question in my re-election. 1,900 of you donated $177,394 this week to make sure I can hold this office to represent American interests, not foreign interests,” the Massie campaign wrote on Thursday.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC] is also trying to defeat the congressman. In an exclusive interview with the Daily Caller, Massie alleged that AIPAC is seeking to suppress dissent in Congress by maintaining leverage over lawmakers through the threat of primary challengers should they stray away from a strong pro-Israel stance.
The congressman told Fox News Digital that “the biggest impact of Trump getting involved on the other side of a race is usually diminished fund raising” but that in his case “we’re seeing the opposite effect.”
He also claimed that the people donating to him strongly believe lawmakers should vote in the interest of voters rather than being “a rubber stamp for the President or beholden to foreign interest groups like AIPAC.”
Massie was also one of two Republicans to vote against Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” citing concerns about the impact the bill will have on the U.S. deficit. Widely regarded to be a fiscal hawk, Massie referred to the bill as a “debt bomb ticking.”
The Kentucky congressman also introduced a resolution on June 17, along with Democratic California Rep. Ro Khanna, that sought to prevent President Trump from waging “unauthorized hostilities” against Iran. He even labeled Trump’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as unconstitutional Saturday on X.
This ultimately drove Trump to write that he will seek to primary the congressman in the 2026 midterm elections. “Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky is not MAGA, even though he likes to say he is. Actually, MAGA doesn’t want him, doesn’t know him, and doesn’t respect him,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on Sunday.
“The good news is that we will have a wonderful American Patriot running against him in the Republican Primary, and I’ll be out in Kentucky campaigning really hard,” Trump continued on.
Massie currently has one primary opponent in Niki Lee Ethington, who is a registered nurse. Others such as CNN contributor Scott Jennings and former Ambassador to the United Nations (UN) Kelly Craft could also be potential outsiders. State Sen. Aaron Reed and state Rep. Kimberly Moser are also being tossed as names who can challenge Massie according to Axios.
Trump has yet to make an endorsement in the primary.
When asked to comment, Massie’s office referred the Daily Caller News Foundation to an X post the congressman’s campaign account made on Friday afternoon.
“Their attack on me is backfiring. Since Monday, 2627 patriots have donated $237,487,” Massie wrote in the post. “It would be great to reach $250k by Saturday. The superPAC bought $430k of ads against me for this coming week but we get to buy ads cheaper from a real campaign account.”
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect Massie’s Friday afternoon X post which reported an updated fundraising total.
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