The New York Times warned on May 18 that an astonishingly unpopular president was about to destroy the Republican Party: “Trump’s Approval Sinks Amid Unpopular War, Darkening G.O.P. Prospects.” Discussing new poll results, the newspaper concluded that “the survey suggests that Republican candidates are entering their general-election races with stark political liabilities.” Anyone tied to Donald Trump was doomed.
On May 19, covering the defeat of Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie in that state’s primary election, The New York Times concluded that the results had proved “the president’s power to punish his critics.” A second story that same day similarly framed the Kentucky race as “a referendum on Mr. Trump’s influence over his party,” proof of the president’s power.
If you’re keeping score at home, this means that Donald Trump is a wounded animal: crippled, broken, hated, powerless. Also, he has an iron grip on his party, which moves in unison at his merest expression of whim. He’s impotent and all-powerful, wounded and helpless and the last apex predator in the woods. Any candidate tied to Trump is bound to lose, dragged down by a hated president, and also anyone he endorses wins, proving his power. Send word if it makes any sense to you, because we all have a headache.
The legacy media don’t know what it means. They don’t know what’s happening. They’re tourists in a foreign land, trying to puzzle their way through the strange customs of the locals.
As Federalist CEO and co-founder Sean Davis noted Wednesday, Massie didn’t lose his seat because Trump suddenly announced that he didn’t like the man. “Trump mercilessly trashed Massie in 2020,” Davis writes. Then Massie won reelection several times. So if you anger Trump, you lose your seat, except for the three times after you anger Trump and he says so publicly but you keep your seat. The Trump-pushed-him explanation doesn’t work.
Neither does the one about Israel. Massie’s defeat is being widely depicted as a win for AIPAC: oppose Zionists, kept tossed out of Congress. Massie himself is gesturing broadly at the same argument:
But Massie has always been an outspoken critic of Israel, and of AIPAC, and of Zionist sentiment in American politics, as he’s won reelection over and over again. Nothing changed. Massie lost an election as a critic of Israel after repeatedly winning elections as a critic of Israel.
If you’re looking for an explanation of Massie’s defeat in a Republican primary election, consider the extraordinary possibility that Republican voters might have had something to do with it, having made their own evaluation about the quality of his service in public office. The change in the last two years is that Massie entered into a political partnership with Democrats, allying with the Bay Area Congressman Ro Khanna, a particularly repellent Democrat, to try to harm Trump politically. He was also one of two Republicans in the House to vote against the Big Beautiful Bill, the landmark legislation of Trump’s second term.
Republican voters are punishing elected officials who don’t work consistently to advance the agenda of the Republican Party and its much-ignored base, while also telling a clear story about working to advance a Republican agenda. Republican voters are … Republicans. Massie didn’t lose because of Donald Trump or because of Benjamin Netanyahu.
He was defeated because enough Republican voters in his district lost faith that he was working in their interest and in a way that consistently represented their views. The Thomas Massie who wrote the PRIME Act was appreciated and respected, and deserves to be. The Thomas Massie who had fans on MS NOW was somewhat less popular.
The voters mattered, and not simply as the mindless instruments of Trump the Sorcerer that the media want them to be. The populist vote connects to the populous in a moment of lost political faith. Complicated, for sure, and too hard for The New York Times, but something to ponder. Voter sentiment may just play a role in elections. Spread the word.
