Time now to go inside Kentucky politics with our two faves.

We've got Trey Grayson and Bob Babbage.

As we round the corner here on primary Election 2026, we are really going to dive deep into the fourth Congressional District race because there's a lot happening there.

Trey Grayson, from the fundraising, the, ads and all kinds of things that have been going on.

In this race for the next few days, is going to be the most watched race in the country.

I mean, it's kind of been that way.

I remember a couple days ago I got a call from three different New York Times reporters on the same day, and two of them didn't know that they were both going to be in the state this week.

Oh, wow.

Different editors.

So people all across the country are looking at this race.

One of the national lens is a referendum on Trump.

Massie has stood up to Trump.

Trump got out, essentially did an overall call.

Guy Ryan stepped up.

He's been funded, supported Trump did, you know, did a visit a few few months ago.

There was a poll this week that came out that showed that guy Ryan had moved to a little bit of a into a little bit of a lead.

Not a lot of public polling and primary polling, as we know, is hard, but I think you just step back.

This is a close race.

He's been in office for a long time, but this is the first time he's had, you know, anything like this, 20 over $20 million of outside money.

I can't tell you how many mailers.

I live in the fourth district, the number of mailers I get on a daily basis from one or the other, or independent groups.

It's just incredible.

And a lot, a lot of ads.

So what what he's trying to do is hold on, and what we're trying to do is stitch together a coalition of folks who want somebody who's more supportive of Trump.

But then there's also a group of northern Kentuckians that have gotten frustrated with Massie over the years just because of his libertarian ways.

And so does that get you to 51%?

You know, we're going to find out on Tuesday.

This will be the thing we're most focused on, I think on Tuesday night.

Absolutely.

And there are a couple other interesting Northern Kentucky races that will be following in the judge executive race.

Yeah, very interesting there.

Gary Moore getting a run for his money with two.

I don't know if they're newcomers, but they're two young folks who are.

Yeah we've got a couple interesting races.

Another element is how much this should increase turnout.

Right.

How much does it increase turnout.

Yeah.

Secretary of State Michael Adams has said when he's been interviewed this week that he expects overall turnout, not just for the district to be about 20%, but he said it could be north of that because of these county races and that people are motivated by that.

First of all, go back to the fourth district for you, Bob, what are your thoughts about this race and how it's shaping up?

Tremendous amount of attention here, because it's not only our competitive race in Kentucky, but it says a lot about, the political structure, political priorities and, and more.

The amount of money Trey mentioned, the 20 million.

But you also said that's.

Outside my.

Earlier.

So that's outside money.

And it's about even which is significant, in most of our, analysis, it's too close to call in many ways.

It keeps going back and forth.

We could dissect, the Massie tenure, in multiple ways.

Boone County, Campbell are among the most prosperous, enviable counties in the country, not just the state.

For the state, they're incredibly valuable.

Valuable economically.

But they want a congressmember who will focus on that economy more than Massie has.

Still, Massie says, I vote with Republicans 90, 91% of the time.

Yes.

Except when they start wars.

Yeah.

Or the.

What?

Where they just fed.

Yeah.

So most people in Kentucky would say, well, I'm against wars and I'm against deficit spending.

Of course, we all want our share, but we say that in theory.

So he catches on and people often say, you've heard it said I want somebody who will go and represent their values, their true convictions.

He is the perfect example, right?

14 years he's been consistent.

The other thing that's interesting about this race is here you have the incumbent who will go anywhere.

He's the one with.

When somebody skips the county debate, it's normally the incumbent, not him.

Not he's here with you.

Right.

Got Ryan.

The challenger would normally relish.

Challengers normally relish to get out in front of people.

And Guy Ryan is basically running the kind of campaign that they know they have a message.

It's the Trump message.

And and Guy Ryan has, to his credit, has got a good he's got a good bio, but he's leaning in and is in it's advertising more often than not.

He's looking in the camera, talking or narrating.

He's trying to use his personality.

He's trying to get beyond the caricature of the guy who votes no, right?

The guy who stops, who stands with AOC is my mailers.

Mailers, my box of set.

So it is fascinating watching this incumbent trying to lean in and being more accessible and getting trying to get people to know him better or to remind them of, you know, of his personality.

Yeah.

So, so many interesting power.

Yeah.

Sorry for interrupting.

Governance is battle tested, not just militarily, but he had a a Senate race that looked like he might win.

That's kind of the the pick of many leaders didn't work out that way.

I'm sure he learned a lot from that that he's applied in this race.

It's hard to pick that one.

And then the county race up there in Boone also generating interest and turnout at all.

The spike turnout in Northern Kentucky, which at times Trey, frustrating to you and me, northern Kentucky turnout has been very low compared to the balance of the state.

Do you think it would be lower than the 20%?

I mean, if it got to 20%, that'd be a good turnout for our region.

Well, and even Michael Adams has said that 20% is nothing to boast about.

But yeah.

We usually we usually have the lowest in the county election year.

In the primaries, we usually have the lowest turnout in the state.

That's interesting considering all that's at stake in that area you just talked about.

Boone.

Can camel being the juggernaut of the.

Well, that may be different again this year because of because of the fourth district race, the attention and the money.

I mean, you can't avoid the fact that there's a there's an election.

And, and then you do have this really competitive race in Boone County.

Kenton County has several competitive legislative races, but they're mostly in Kenton, Kim Banta, Kim Mosher.

There's some competitive congressional races in Kenton County.

Steve Henry in Campbell County.

The judge there also has an opponent.

So there's a lot going on.

But there's often a lot going on.

It's just sort of, you know, that we don't have enough time to get into some of the challenges.

Maybe we.

Will.

Tuesday be on Tuesday night.

We'll have more time to talk about that.

Yeah, but.

Those are tremendous leaders.

And these are the Republican incumbents who serve in the state House.

Correct.

You know, troughs two for three and the third one is not decided yet.

He definitely influenced the U.S.

Senate race dramatically, the congressional race in the sixth district as well.

And now he's got it all.

But on this upset of Marcy, Go, Ryan, anytime you beat an incumbent, I call it an upset.

Yeah, but we'll be watching that race all Tuesday night.

And this is the one he cares the most about.

I mean, the other two, in some respects, I think you can make a strong case that Alvarado and Barr earned that endorsement.

Guy Ryan isn't a competitive gives competitive in this race that this is probably not running without the.

Fact that it's like the Trump factor is the X. Factor here.

But everything else.

Yeah.

The other thing I think is interesting is if Warren pulls this off, is how many folks are going to be watching us on Tuesday night in Northern Kentucky thinking, darn it, I should have run.

I could have been in Congress.

Well, many people.

Have, and I got a few names in my head.

Or I think you're kicking themselves because there's been this effort of not just this cycle, but in prior cycles to try to find somebody to run against Marcy with promises of funding, which is always the hardest thing to do, is get the money so you can make your case to the voters.

In this case, you have a presidential endorsement.

When the president, even with his lack of popularity around the country, right now inside the party, it's still really, really high.

And nobody, you know, nobody, nobody in Northern Kentucky stepped up.

You took this guy from the far into the district, Shelby County, sometimes not even in the fourth district who lost his last race.

He said, I'm going to do it.

I want to serve.

I've served my country.

I'll step up and do it again.

Yeah.

That's pretty good bona fides on the surface, too.

Yeah.

For sure.

Yeah.

So there's also been real quickly we got like 25 seconds left.

There's been some interesting talk around the fourth district around Massey and a former girlfriend and some hush money sort that out.

For an 20s.

Yeah.

So there was a former girlfriend who's who's alleged that she was having some employment challenges with her boss, a different member of Congress, and that Massey may have, offered to pay her some money.

He denies it.

But I think the.

Legs at this point.

I think the challenges is it's so close to the election and it's a little it's confusing.

And so voters getting something at the last minute, that's not an obvious thing.

I don't anticipate it having much of a difference, but you know, in a very, very close race of it causes, you know, 500 people to switch their votes one way or another, because it could be 500 people saying, this is dirty pool, and I'm going to stick with Massey because this this smells like a political trick coming out at the last minute.

You know, when it's this close, anything, anything can matter.

And the other race that we'll talk about on Tuesday night that's not even on the ballot.

That's Kentucky Governor James Comer again, made a little news and made a little space on the social media by saying it's unofficially official.

So he has some unofficial.

Yeah, he has to be careful because as soon as he announces he's a candidate, he has to resign as committee chair.

So that's why he has to be cute.

Unlike, say, 25 years ago when Ernie Fletcher ran for governor while he was running for reelection, he wasn't a committee chair, so he could do that.

But he's got to be careful.

And that's why he's going to wait as long as he can.

Yeah.

All right.

Lots of talk about Tuesday night.

Cannot wait.

So glad that you guys will be with us.

Thank you.

Looking forward to it.