A cold call from the president? KY voters hear from Trump in Barr ‘tele-rally’
Many Kentucky Republicans got a call from an unlikely person Monday night: President Donald Trump.
As part of a “tele-rally” hosted by the primary political action committee supporting Rep. Andy Barr to replace Sen. Mitch McConnell, Trump extolled Barr and other Kentucky candidates he’s endorsed. He also riffed on current affairs, like the war in Iran and the conduct of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
The call showed up on scores of voters’ phones as a “political call” from Keep America Great PAC.
In addition to Barr, Trump rallied in support of Ed Gallrein, the former state Senate candidate running against Rep. Thomas Massie, and Ralph Alvarado, his pick in the open Central Kentucky congressional seat being left by Barr.
“These are three great guys,” Trump said on the call, riffing for more than 10 minutes.
In his comments on Barr, Trump called back to his support for Barr in his close race against Amy McGrath, now a Democratic U.S. Senate candidate who he beat by 3 percentage points in 2018. He called Barr “a proven winner and patriot.”
“I’ve known him for a long time, and I endorsed Andy years ago. I endorsed him in his run for Congress, and we had a great success. He started off behind. People didn’t know him, and now they know him, and now he’s doing great. Once they get to know him, he does great, but we had a big victory together, Andy, and in his first race for Congress, it was incredible. And ever since, Andy’s always been there when we needed him. He was always just absolutely stand-up for Kentucky, and for me, always 100%, unlike this Thomas Massie character,” Trump said.
Much of Trump’s monologue centered around Massie. The president and his political network have backed Gallrein in his run against Massie for months, as Massie has been a continual thorn in Trump’s side on foreign affairs, his marquee budget bill and his successful push to force the release of the files related to Jeffrey Epstein.
At a March Northern Kentucky rally, Trump called Massie a “total disaster as a congressman, and, frankly, a human being.” He struck a similar chord on the call Monday night, calling the longtime 4th Congressional District representative the “worst Republican congressman in the history of the country.”
Trump also speculated falsely that Massie would support gender reassignment surgery for minors, something the congressman has proposed a bill to ban.
“He wants men to play in women’s sports, he voted against that one. I mean, men playing in women’s sports and transgender for everyone? He’s okay with it, because he voted in favor of transgender for everyone — I call it the transgender mutilization (sic) of our children. And if he had his way, ICE, Border Patrol, and Homeland Security would be totally defunded — ‘defund’ like defund the police. Defund the good ol’ police — he would probably be okay with it,” Trump said.
Massie has not supported totally defunding any of those organizations, though he has voted against bills sending more money to those organizations — and various other government agencies — on the grounds that they would add to the national debt.
Trump repeated his line that Gallrein was a “central casting” candidate.
“When you meet him and you shake his hand, you say, ‘This guy’s a strong cookie.’ He shook my hand, I said, “Wow, who the hell is that? He’s a strong guy.’ Like, literally, I use the expression ‘central casting.’ He’s great, and a fifth generation farmer, he’s running against the congressman that’s been so disloyal and so horrible to the Republican Party and to our country,” Trump said.
Trump had relatively less, but still positive, things to say about Alvarado.
He called the former state senator from Winchester a “MAGA champion” and “just a great member of everything good.”
Unlike with Gallrein, Trump made no mention of Alvarado or Barr’s top opponents — State Rep. Ryan Dotson, R-Winchester, and former Attorney General Daniel Cameron, respectively.
On current affairs, Trump gave an update on how he sees the war in Iran, which his administration began in late February. Since then, due in part to Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping lane, the price of oil and gas has risen sharply.
“Gasoline is going to come tumbling down as soon as the war is over, and they want it — Iran wants it to end soon. They’ve taken big punishment, and it’s very simple: they cannot have a nuclear weapon to blow up Kentucky and to blow up every place else. We’re not going to let that happen,” Trump said.
