Trump critic Thomas Massie defeated in Kentucky Republican House primary

Victory for Ed Gallrein, former Navy Seal hand-picked by Trump, shows strength of president’s grip on party

Donald Trump displayed his supremacy over the Republican party on Tuesday when voters in northern Kentucky rejected the maverick congressman Thomas Massie in favour of the US president’s hand-picked challenger.

Ed Gallrein, a retired Navy Seal and farmer who was recruited into the race by Trump, defeated the seven-term incumbent in a primary election in Kentucky’s fourth congressional district in what the president’s allies framed as a test of whether dissent could still exist inside today’s Republican party.