Brandishing his loyalty to President Donald Trump and keeping retiring Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) at arm’s length has proven to be an early, lucrative campaign fundraising tactic for Rep. Andy Barr (R-KY) in his quest to replace the former Senate GOP leader.
“I don’t just talk about supporting President Trump,” Barr, serving his seventh term, told the Washington Examiner in an interview. “I’m doing it every day.”
But despite his close relationship with the president and backing from a string of MAGA allies in Congress, Barr remains in pursuit of the coveted Trump endorsement.
So too are the two men with whom he’s locked in a bitter primary challenge for Kentucky’s open Senate seat next year, being vacated by McConnell: former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron and wealthy businessman Nate Morris.
Discussions with Trump or those in his orbit are to remain “private conversations,” Barr said. But in between rattling off Trump’s policy wins over the years that he’s played a hand in, the Senate hopeful projected confidence that he’d be the obvious choice for an endorsement. That is, should the president choose to weigh in.
“There’s politicians who like to talk about supporting President Trump,” Barr said. “There’s politicians who like to talk about the One Big, Beautiful Bill. I have to write it. I have to pass it. And I’m a proven ‘America First’ conservative.”
Although limited independent polling on one of the nastier Republican Senate primaries of the 2026 midterm elections, surveys earlier this year suggested Cameron had a commanding double-digit lead. Barr’s campaign said an internal poll taken earlier this month and provided to the Washington Examiner shows positive momentum for Barr after months of crisscrossing the state with nearly 60 events, despite being outspent by Morris on the airwaves.
Among 600 likely Kentucky GOP primary voters and a margin of error of plus or minus four points, Barr had a net positive image rating of 16 percentage points from respondents compared to Morris’s net negative rating of four percentage points.
Still, Cameron appeared to be leading the pack, thanks to his broader name recognition from holding statewide office. His net positive rating was 40 percentage points.
In a statement to the Washington Examiner, Morris condemned Barr as a phony MAGA loyalist, citing episodes like donating through his leadership PAC to now-former House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, and accused him of flip-flopping on issues now that he’s running for higher office.
“Andy Barr blamed Donald Trump for January 6th. He backed the members of Congress who tried to throw Trump out of office. Barr tried for years to sabotage President Trump’s tariff agenda. He spent millions of taxpayer dollars on DEI nonsense,” Morris said. “Barr even called people who want to deport illegals ‘nativists’ and funded Congress’s latest attempt at mass amnesty. If Andy Barr is MAGA, then so is Hillary Clinton.”
Opponents have criticized Morris for a 2021 campaign donation to former South Carolina Republican Gov. Nikki Haley, who went on to run for president against Trump, and his past promotions of DEI as a former CEO.
Similar to Morris, the Cameron campaign accused Barr of realigning himself with conservatism for the primary and referred to him as “McConnell’s handpicked candidate,” though McConnell has declined to get involved in a contest where its participants are all clambering to be the least associated. Cameron was once considered his protege, and Barr previously referred to him as a “mentor.”
“He’s a creature of D.C. who spent decades shaking down Big Banks and Big Pharma for checks to fund his re-brand from moderate RINO to whatever this is now,” Cameron Campaign Manager Taylor Zanazzi said in a statement.
Analysis by Govtrack.us, an independent Congress tracker, rates Barr as skewed the farthest politically right among his House colleagues from Kentucky. There is no direct comparison available for Cameron and Morris.
The Republican trio has sought to tap into their most conservative ideologies while keeping a safe distance from McConnell, who has a prior relationship with all three from his decades atop Kentucky GOP politics.
Morris has went a step further in seeking to keep distance from McConnell. A former McConnell intern who held a fundraiser for him a decade ago, Morris now refers to him as “the nastiest politician in the history of America.”
An establishment figure with an icy relationship toward Trump, McConnell has proven to be a political liability in a modern-day Republican primary, even if that race is for the very seat he’s vacating.
“I’ve been asked for 13 years, as a member of Congress from Kentucky, are you a Rand Paul Republican or a Mitch McConnell Republican? I’m neither,” Barr said. “I’m an Andy Barr Republican, and I’m proud to have supported President Trump in both his first four years, and I’m the strongest supporter in the House.”
The ability to raise funds may not tell the whole story, as polling has shown Cameron, despite his campaign coffers, vastly trailing Barr. But it offers a window into where supporters and potential voters are most eager to put their money, and it could play a role in who other influential Republicans choose to back.
Fundraising data available through June showed that Barr raised a hefty $6.1 million, compared to Cameron’s roughly $530,000.
Morris presents a wildcard factor in the fundraising fight. Since entering the race, he’s yet to face a filing deadline, and he has the financial ability to self-fund his campaign. He launched a seven-figure ad buy just days after declaring his candidacy in July.
BARR LEADS CAMERON IN FUNDRAISING IN KENTUCKY GOP SENATE PRIMARY
McConnell has shown no desire to get involved in the chaotic three-way contest. But his establishment donors apparently feel otherwise. Wealthy party donors linked to McConnell and other GOP leaders have already put millions of dollars into kneecapping Morris’s candidacy.
“I don’t know about McConnell donors. What I do know about are my donors,” Barr said. “I know about people who are supporting me, and they’re supporting me because they know, No. 1, that I’m a proven ‘America First’ conservative who believes in limited government, free enterprises, strong national defense.”
