The Guy Who Got Fired for Telling the Truth

Why Thomas Massie Should Be President in 2028

Jun 05, 2026

I’ve followed Thomas Massie for years. Not just because he’s the most consistently libertarian vote in Congress, but because he’s the kind of man I respect on a personal level. He’s well educated, genuinely self-reliant, and a father who actually built something for his family with his own hands. He’s not performing a persona or following a label.

Two weeks ago, the most expensive House primary in American history ended exactly the way Washington wanted it to. Thomas Massie lost his seat. The machine that beat him cost north of $33 million. Pro-Israel PACs. Trump-backed super PACs. The full weight of a sitting president who called Massie “the worst congressman in the Republican Party” — because Massie refused to vote for a bill that will add $3.4 trillion to the national debt.

Let that sink in. The man who got fired voted no on adding trillions of dollars we don’t have to a debt that’s already eating us alive. The men who fired him voted yes.

And the crowd that watched him lose started chanting “2028.”

So did I.

WHO IS THOMAS MASSIE, ACTUALLY

Massie graduated from MIT with both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in engineering. He didn’t go to Washington to network. He and his wife raised four kids largely off the grid on a solar-powered home he designed himself, on a thousand-acre Kentucky farm where he raises cattle, grows peaches, and does the kind of work that used to be called building something. He’s not a career politician who stumbled into conviction. He’s a guy who actually believes what he says, which is apparently a disqualifying characteristic in 2026.

His politics don’t fit cleanly in anybody’s box, and that’s the point. He voted against the Patriot Act. He voted against COVID lockdown spending. He voted against the Big Beautiful Bill. He voted against Trump’s military strike on Iran because he said it was unconstitutional without a congressional declaration of war. He was also the key Republican who forced a vote to release the Epstein files, which the sitting president opposed until it was clear Congress would override him.

His one test for every bill is simple: does the federal government have the constitutional authority to do this? If not, he votes no. Every time. Without exception. For fourteen years. That consistency is what got him killed politically, and it’s exactly why I want him in the White House.

THE DEBT IS THE ISSUE. EVERYTHING ELSE IS BACKGROUND NOISE.

I’ve written before about the dollar, inflation, and what runaway government spending actually does to working families. I want to return to that, because if you understand one number right now, it changes how you see everything else.

The federal government will spend $1 trillion on interest payments on the national debt in fiscal year 2026 alone. Not on defense. Not on Medicare. Not on roads or schools or any of the things politicians promise when they’re running. Just on interest. Just on the cost of carrying what we already owe.

In just the first three months of fiscal year 2026, interest payments hit $270 billion — more than what the United States spent on national defense in that same period. We are now spending more to service the past than to protect the present.

The CBO projects interest costs will more than double from $1 trillion in 2026 to $2.1 trillion by 2036. By 2048, interest becomes the single largest line item in the entire federal budget… exceeding defense, exceeding Social Security, exceeding everything. Over thirty years, the projected interest tab alone approaches $100 trillion.

That’s not a political problem. That’s an engineering problem. It compounds. It accelerates. It crowds out everything else until there’s nothing left.

Massie called it exactly what it is on the floor of the House:

This bill is a debt bomb ticking. Congress can do funny math, fantasy math, if it wants, but bond investors don’t.

Then he voted no. Then he lost his seat.

The rest of his colleagues did the funny math, voted yes, and kept their jobs.

This is the world we live in.

THE UNIPARTY PROBLEM, EXPLAINED BY ONE PRIMARY RACE

I’ve also talked about the Uniparty for years. Both parties, different jerseys, same fundamental attachment to spending money they don’t have to protect power they don’t deserve. The Massie primary was a perfect case study in how it actually works.

He wasn’t beaten by Democrats. He was beaten by his own party, funded by a sitting Republican president, because he refused to add trillions to the debt that Republican president wanted added. The party that spent twenty years screaming about deficits spent $33 million to remove the one guy who actually voted like he meant it.

The most expensive House primary in American history. Not a Senate seat. Not a swing state. A safe Kentucky House district. That tells you everything you need to know about how dangerous the establishment found one man with principles and no price tag.

In his concession speech, Massie said two things that deserve to be repeated:

There is a yearning in this country for someone who will vote for principles over party.
If the legislative branch always votes with the president, we do have a king.

That’s not partisan. That’s foundational. That’s the whole point of the separation of powers. And he said it the night he lost.

I’m a libertarian who voted for Trump the 2nd time. That vote was more of an anti-vote against the Democrats than a vote in favor of Trump. So I’m not writing this from some anti-MAGA perch. I understand the instinct. I just want the government to get out of my wallet, stay out of my health decisions, respect the Constitution it swore to uphold, and stop mortgaging my kids’ futures to buy its own re-election. Thomas Massie has voted that way, without deviation, for fourteen years against pressure from both parties and every president he served under.

That is extraordinarily rare.

WHY MASSIE MAKES SENSE ON MORE THAN JUST THE DEBT

The debt is the headliner, but Massie’s record is broader than fiscal policy.

On the Federal Reserve, he’s been sponsoring the Audit the Fed bill for years, arguing that an institution that creates trillions of dollars with zero public accountability should at minimum be subject to an independent audit. He even introduced legislation to abolish the Fed, on the grounds that it has systematically devalued the dollar and enabled the kind of deficit spending that causes the inflation ordinary Americans absorb in their grocery bills and mortgage rates. I’m not ready to go full abolish-the-Fed myself, but the transparency argument is bulletproof.

On civil liberties, Massie voted against warrantless surveillance, against surveillance power expansions, and against measures he saw as unconstitutional regardless of which party proposed them. His stated philosophy is “live and let live.” You don’t worry about what your neighbor’s doing in his holler, if he doesn’t worry about what you’re doing in yours. I grew up in the South. That’s not a slogan. That’s a worldview that actually respects people.

On foreign policy, Massie applies constitutional standards consistently. He opposed the Iran strike because Congress never declared it. He can be wrong about specific outcomes and still be right about the process. The Constitution requires a declaration of war from Congress. It doesn’t say “unless the president really wants to.”

On trade, he’s skeptical of tariffs because he understands that they raise costs for American families and consumers. This puts him at odds with the current populist consensus in his own party, and I respect him more for it. Populism feels good. Economics doesn’t care how it feels.

THE ELECTABILITY QUESTION (AND WHY IT’S THE WRONG QUESTION)

Experts say Massie has “no chance” in a Republican primary given his break with Trump. They note that if he can’t win his own safe House seat, he can’t win delegates across the country.

Fair enough. On current trajectory, that’s probably accurate.

But “electability” is a trap. The electability question always gets asked about candidates who tell the truth and never gets asked about candidates who lie effectively. We spent decades electing “electable” candidates from both parties and we now have a $39 trillion debt, trillion-dollar annual interest payments, a hollowed-out middle class, and a government that can’t pass a budget without borrowing more or threatening to shut down.

The electable candidates built all of that. Maybe stop taking electoral advice from the people who built the problem.

What Massie would bring to a 2028 race, whether he wins the primary or not, is a standard. A test. A set of questions every other candidate would be forced to answer: Do you support adding to the debt? Will you audit the Fed? Will you require a congressional declaration before going to war? Will you apply the Constitution equally regardless of which party benefits?

Those questions need to be on the ballot in 2028. Thomas Massie is the guy who would put them there.

My unCommon Sense

The chants at Massie’s election night party weren’t grief. They were recognition.

His supporters were still fired up, chanting “2028” and “Massie for president.” And Massie smiled and said, “We’re just getting started.”

I believe him. Not because I think he’ll win easily… he won’t. The same machine that spent $33 million to take out one House seat will spend ten times that to stop a presidential campaign. But the conversation he would force, the questions he would demand be answered, the standard he would hold every other candidate to, that’s worth something regardless of the outcome.

America is sitting on a fiscal time bomb and our political system just ejected the guy who kept saying “this is a time bomb.” The two parties will offer us their versions of “electable,” and those versions will differ mostly in which constituencies they promise to borrow money for.

I’d rather vote for the MIT engineer who built his own house, raises his own cattle, reads the Constitution like it means something, and calls the debt clock what it is: a countdown.

He hasn’t ruled out 2028.

Neither have I.

If you want to have a constructive conversation about this or anything else, message me at dan@thrailkill.us, and let’s grab coffee or a beer.

Have a good one,

Dan

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