[music] >> On primary eve, a Trump cabinet member takes a stand in the most expensive House primary race ever.

[MUSIC] >> What we're seeing in the numbers is it is not the Senate race or even the congressional races that are driving the turnout.

>> So what is getting voters to the polls and how many might turn out on Election Day?

>> We'll figure that one out when in fact, we have that to figure out.

If we have that to figure out.

>> It's head spinning.

As voters figure out and political parties adjust to brand new nonpartisan races in Louisville.

[MUSIC] >> Our focus is on taking coal and converting it over into high value graphic products.

[MUSIC] >> And why coal could soon power the future in a whole new way.

[MUSIC] >> Production of Kentucky edition is made possible in part by the KET Millennium Fund.

>> Good evening and welcome to Kentucky Edition for Monday, May 18th.

I'm Laura Rogers filling in for Renee Shaw.

Thank you for joining us on this primary election.

Eve, we begin with coverage of the race for the fourth Congressional District.

U.S.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth joined Republican candidate Ed Gallrein on the campaign trail today in Northern Kentucky, speaking to a crowd of supporters in Hebron, Gallrein told voters he's ready to strengthen our national security and reshape the military, Secretary Hegseth said.

Northern Kentuckians have an imperative to kick, quote, obstructionist Thomas Massie out of Congress.

>> Under Joe Biden, Washington liberal elites decided they wanted to remake the military into a laboratory for woke politics, didn't they?

They focus on pronouns instead of preparedness, climate seminars instead of combat readiness, diversity quotas instead of lethality, political correctness instead of the warrior culture, recruitment collapsed, morale cratered.

Confidence in military leadership fell to historic lows, and our enemies noticed.

China noticed, Russia noticed, Iran noticed.

And the terrorist notice didn't they?

Didn't they?

Weakness invites danger.

I saw it all and the American people knew something was wrong too, because they could see it, couldn't you?

Right before your very eyes.

It was shameful.

>> Ed Gallrein record speaks for itself.

Thomas Massie's record speaks for itself too.

Too much grandstanding, too few great votes, years of acting like being difficult is the same thing as being courageous.

It's not real.

Courage means stepping up when the mission matters most, when we need that tough vote to beat left wing lunatic Democrats, the most real courage means understanding that this country is facing existential threats and deciding to be part of the solution.

Instead of constantly trying to position yourself above the fight.

Kentucky has a choice.

In this race, you can send a warrior reinforcements for the president.

In our shared fight against the radical left, or you can send an obstructionist.

In my mind, it's an easy choice.

>> We accept that applause on.

>> The Pentagon, says Secretary Hegseth.

Trip to Northern Kentucky was in his own personal capacity, adding that no taxpayer dollars were used for the visit.

With the president's endorsement, Gallrein success or failure on Tuesday may be seen as a testament to Trump's power and popularity with Kentucky's fourth district voters.

Appearing on ABC This Week on Sunday, Thomas Massie talked about his visit to Kentucky to stump for Gallrein and why he thinks that and other efforts by President Donald Trump to unseat him from Congress won't succeed.

>> You've actually said this week that this that your vote is a referendum on whether Israel gets to buy seats in Congress.

What did you mean by that?

>> Well, the RJC, AIPAC and Miriam Adelson and Paul Singer, they're all part of the Israeli lobby, and that's where all the money comes from.

And it will be a referendum on foreign policy, whether Israel gets to dictate that by, you know, bullying members of Congress.

And I'm the one they haven't been able to bully.

So they're putting all the brunt, the force on me.

But you can tell that I'm ahead in the polls and they're desperate.

That's why they're sending the secretary of war to my district tomorrow.

That's why the president is losing sleep and tweeting about this.

That's why AIPAC has dumped another $3 million into my race this weekend, is because they're panicked, and they really haven't been able to gain a lead in this race.

>> You say the president is desperate, but he's got a pretty good record of defeating people he wants to target in Republican primaries.

He saw Bill Cassidy yesterday.

We saw what happened in Indiana.

How are you going to be able to overcome the president's opposition?

>> Well, I have the endorsement of the right to life organizations, the gun organizations.

I had four members of Congress come here yesterday and campaign with me.

So my situation is a little bit different.

Plus, I've had millions of dollars come in from the grassroots, tens of thousands of donors to my website, Thomas Massie dot com, and it's still coming in, and that's how we're going to beat them.

>> According to Politico, the race between Massie and Gallrein is the most expensive house primary on record, with overall ad spending topping $32 million.

And now to the U.S.

Senate race.

Republican Andy Barr was on the campaign trail Sunday.

He arrived by private jet a little after 5:00 last night at the Bowling Green Warren County Regional Airport.

The Keep America Great PAC hosted a rally with the congressman.

It included remarks from county and state elected officials.

Barr's family was also by his side.

He spoke on economic development in south central Kentucky, calling Warren County the economic engine of the Commonwealth.

>> Whether it's our energy potential, our energy and our energy potential, our manufacturing prowess, the fact that we have these incredible strengths that no other state in the world, in the country and in the world has, which are, you know, our signature industries like bourbon and horses and energy.

But it's also our agriculture sector.

And yes, with Fort Campbell just down the road, the defense industrial base potential of this of this region is enormous, enormous.

So I want to be a teammate.

I want to be a partner with all of you, all to take advantage of the growth that we have, but also recognize that with growth comes challenges.

And that means we need infrastructure.

That means we need to keep pace with all of the growth that's happening here.

>> How are you?

>> Lewis Barr also made appearances in Monroe County's Tompkinsville and in the city of Glasgow in Barron County on Sunday.

Barr's opponent, Daniel Cameron, continued his campaign tour over the weekend, making stops in Northern Kentucky.

At one campaign stop, the former state attorney general, Cameron touted his record of supporting law enforcement.

>> It's honestly one of the interesting places that they've tried to attack me because I've been endorsed by over 100 law enforcement officials.

I mean, people know my track record when it comes to standing firm for them, standing in support of law and order.

I tell people all the time, Senator heard me say this.

You know, my law enforcement position can be summed up in a Waylon Jennings song that starts off with, I'm for Law and Order the way that it should be.

And I think, I think all of us, I think all of us, yeah, know the importance of having someone that's going to stand with law enforcement when it's difficult.

And the fact of the matter is, is that, you know, there were other folks that are in this race right now that when I was taking a courageous stand for law enforcement, were calling them racist.

>> Cameron is making final stops on his campaign tour today with events in Oldham, Bullitt and Hardin counties also campaigning.

Over the weekend, Democratic U.S.

Senate candidate Charles Booker.

We caught up with him in Louisville's West End Saturday as he took advantage of early voting.

Booker says he feels confident he will be on the ballot in November.

>> We know that we're in a position to win this primary.

I'm honored to say that, but we're working to make it so because should we win this primary and do the work of winning this election in November, we can do so much good for the people of Kentucky.

So every phone call, every door knock, every hug, every handshake, every testimony, it matters.

>> Another Democratic candidate for the U.S.

Senate, Lieutenant Colonel Amy McGrath, was at the Aviation Museum of Kentucky.

>> Today she is featured in a new exhibit on Kentucky Women in Aviation.

We caught up with her at the ribbon cutting to see how she's feeling.

On the eve of the primary election.

>> Look, I feel good.

We put in a lot of work.

We crisscrossed the state and talked to Kentucky voters.

Run an actual campaign which we couldn't couldn't really do in 2020, which is awesome because, you know, back then we dealt with Covid.

Now we're getting around everywhere and the message is very clear.

You know, people are upset.

The prices are through the roof for everything, for groceries, for gas now.

And, and we have to get people into office who will work on bringing down those prices and work on bringing health care back to people who can't afford it.

That's really important.

That's what my campaign is centered on.

And just to be a candidate who is practical, who will get things done in Washington, that's what I'm focused on here.

>> In her 2018 run for U.S.

House and her 2020 Senate run, McGrath won the Democratic primaries but lost in the general election.

Nearly 200,000 Kentuckians have already cast a ballot ahead of Election Day.

Secretary of State Michael Adams says more than 155,000 votes were cast during the three days of early no excuse in-person voting.

Nearly 30,000 absentee ballots have also been cast.

Secretary Adams says those numbers suggest overall voter turnout could be above average.

>> So to predict turnout, we look at basically the votes that have been cast before Election Day.

We look at absentee ballots that have been returned.

We've still got about 30% of those that haven't been brought back by the voters.

It's too soon to mail them.

So I want to encourage people to bring them to the polls, bring them to the clerk's office, and we'll take them.

We look at those and we look at the early voting.

And my prediction is, is holding true that we expect just above 20% of registered voters to vote in this election.

We've already had about 5.5% of voters registered participate before Election Day through early voting, but also some absentees.

Generally, that tends to be about a quarter of the vote.

And so if you multiply that, we're looking at about a 20 to 22% turnout.

Well, I sadly have to brag and say I'm very pleased to have 20 or 22% turn out because typically in a primary in Kentucky, we have turnout between 10 and 15%.

So to be at 22 versus 11 is great.

That's twice what we usually have.

I do want to point out that what we're seeing in the numbers is it is not the Senate race or even the congressional races that are driving the turnout.

It is local races and the counties that have the highest turnout so far are in the first district and the fifth district, which don't have competitive races for Congress.

But you have local races that are competitive for county office and local city office.

So every month I've been in office, with only a few exceptions, the Democrats have declined in registration and Republicans have grown in registration, and independents have grown in registration.

In my first term, you saw Republicans growing in independents growing at about the same rate, but more recently, since the 20 2024 election, you've seen actually independents registering at twice the rate of Republicans and in some cases with bigger numbers than Republicans.

That's significant because independents can't vote in primaries, party primaries.

They can vote for a nonpartisan office.

We only have two counties that have nonpartisan county offices.

So the fact that independents are registering in such numbers, when there's no party drives, there's no organized efforts to register independents.

The fact that they're still the fastest growing voter block is significant.

These are people that feel so strongly about detaching from the two major parties that they're self disenfranchizing in May elections, and in many cases, the May election actually elects more people than the November election, because we have so many races that are uncontested in November or not competitive in November.

As our state gets more polarized to the left or the right.

This is driven primarily by generation Z as they're registering.

I have a 19 year old daughter.

Her generation just doesn't want to join stuff.

They they don't trust institutions and they don't like the two parties.

They'll vote in November eventually, but they don't want to belong to a party.

And that's going to impact the turnout as well.

>> We also asked Secretary Adams about the increase of betting on elections, certain contests, including the race in Kentucky's fourth congressional District, are drawing a lot of interest from around the country as the state's top elections official, Secretary Adams says he'd like to see betting on elections regulated.

>> I think this is getting out of control.

The betting on sports betting on elections used to be I was harassed during the election period by election enthusiasts.

I think the elections are rigged now.

I'm harassed by people who want to make money off gambling on our elections, who don't even live here.

I think it's distasteful to have gambling on elections, and a lot of the people who bet on it have access to insider information.

And the only laws that we have now are insider trading laws that don't really fit betting on election.

I'm I'm for some gaming.

I think you should be able to go to the track and things like that.

I'm not sure it's a good idea for us to have people voting on the over and under in elections.

This is something that fraud.

Obviously in our state's history, elections have had fraud on occasion.

And when you bring monetary incentives into that, the number one way that we have fraud in Kentucky history is through vote buying.

And when you incentivize outcomes with money, that's a huge problem.

That's a force multiplier.

So I'd really love to see the legislature ideally Congress regulate this and stop it.

>> Polls are open tomorrow on Election Day from 6 a.m.

to 6 p.m.

local time.

Anyone in line at 6 p.m.

will be allowed to vote.

You can view a sample ballot at go vote.ky.gov.

Ballots in Jefferson County will be much different this primary.

For the first time, Metro Council and mayoral races are nonpartisan as mandated by state law.

Our June Leffler has more on how voters and political parties are adjusting.

>> To understand the new voting landscape in Louisville, you have to look back two years to a heated debate in the state House.

Jefferson County Republicans, representing the outskirts of Louisville pushed for these local, nonpartisan elections.

>> If you won the Democratic primary, that was the end of the day.

>> The mayoral general election has not been competitive in a county where Democratic voters outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1.

And there hasn't been a Republican mayor since 1969 to secure the Democratic primary.

The state lawmaker says candidates courted the city's urban core, a Democratic stronghold rather than the slightly more Republican suburbs.

>> And so I wanted them to have to come out here to get votes, because if you have to hunt a vote somewhere, you care more about their libraries and about their roads.

You care more about the crime in that area.

>> Democrats in Frankfort hated the change.

And this nonpartisan community organizer says it's caused some suspicion.

>> There have been these theories that this change in the law was an attempt to allow for more conservative candidates to have a better chance of winning elections here in Louisville.

>> For the first time, two Republicans could wind up on the general ballot.

But even they say that's unlikely.

The incumbent, who has raised the most money is current Democratic Mayor Craig Greenburg.

>> He's more than likely going to be one of the two names, you know.

And of course, we as Republicans would hope that the second name will be a registered Republican, one of the four that are currently running.

>> The Democratic Party has propped up Greenburg and other Democrats running for Metro Council.

>> Where there are lots of Democrats and perhaps 1 or 2 Republicans.

You know, we we made some endorsements in those races because we just want to make sure that we don't run into a situation where there's two Democrats or two Republicans, ten Democrats and two Republicans go through.

That is the absolute worst case scenario.

>> The Republican Party has, as always, not made endorsements.

>> We don't pick the winner.

We don't pick the favorite.

We want the voters to do that.

>> As far as the Republican side of things, I haven't seen them really push any particular candidates.

As far as getting two Republicans into that final, that final two, that runoff, I mean, slim to none chances that actually happens.

>> But two Democrats at the end is a real possibility.

And what say would the Republican Party have in that case?

>> Come back and talk to me, because that's going to be something that we're going to have to consider as an executive committee and say, okay, is this one we completely sit out on, or how do we want to engage.

>> This community organizer says she's not harping on party affiliation.

>> To us.

We are more focused on who the candidate is.

Is the candidate somebody who has shared lived experience?

Is the candidate, somebody who has a very clear vision about what they want to do in our community.

Are they someone who is going to fight for us and really represent us?

And more importantly, are they going to invite us into being able to govern our communities with them?

>> She's reaching out to Black and unlikely voters.

Another voting bloc, independents who make up 6% of Jefferson County voters, can now vote in the mayoral primary for Kentucky Edition.

I'm June Leffler.

>> Metro Council member seats are also nonpartisan.

This year, Democrats maintain a slim 14 to 12 majority for Kentucky political experts.

Join us on Kentucky tonight here very shortly at 8:00 eastern seven central as they take a closer look at tomorrow's big races and join KET for election returns and analysis that begins tomorrow night at 7:00 eastern, right here on KET.

Kentucky's general fund is now one for the record books.

Senate President Robert Stivers announced today that for the first time in the state's history, Kentucky's general fund revenues have surpassed $2 billion.

Stivers said in a statement.

Quote, Kentucky just posted the strongest monthly revenue performance in state history while maintaining healthy reserves, investing in infrastructure and education, and continuing to improve teacher and state employee pension stability through responsible budgeting.

Lawmakers stayed focused on responsible budgeting, conservative fiscal management, and long term growth.

Despite repeated political narratives predicting these reforms would fail, end quote.

For generations, coal has been a central part of Kentucky's economy and power grid.

But a shift in the energy market toward renewable and cleaner energy sources has led to significant declines in coal production.

Now, researchers at the University of Kentucky have found a way to bring coal into the clean energy mix.

>> One of the missions of the center for Applied Energy Research is to take the state's resources, in this case, coal or other resources, and maximize their value to the economic opportunities of the time.

Our focus is on taking coal and converting it over into high value graphitic products.

And the one we're really focused on right now is battery grade graphite for lithium ion batteries.

Rechargeable lithium ion batteries are around us everywhere we talk.

They're in your phone, in your computer, in your tablets, maybe your car, if you have a plug in hybrid or a plug in electric vehicle.

All of these batteries use a lot of graphite.

In fact, for lithium ion battery, there's far more graphite than there is lithium in the battery.

So in terms of graphite use, it's really all around you.

And the function of graphite really is to store the lithium ions.

The demand for for energy storage, in this case graphite for batteries is actually increasing pretty rapidly across, across the globe, not only for things like battery electric vehicles across globally, but also in batteries, battery energy storage systems.

And these are systems that you might have in your house.

For example, when you, for example, lose power, you can run your house off of these batteries that you may have in your garage or elsewhere.

All of these, along with smaller batteries in your phones and your your tablets in your power tools, for example.

All of these require a lot of graphite.

Now, graphite for energy storage has a value of approximately $10,000 per ton.

That's pretty high.

And right now, about 90% of all of that graphite is imported to the United States.

So one of the things that we're looking to do is to take a natural resource, in this case, coal, a natural resource of Kentucky, which is rich in aromatic carbons, to convert that over in a sensible way into highly crystalline graphite that we can use in batteries.

Now, coal has a value of approximately about $100 a ton.

So there's a large difference in value between the starting material that we're looking at, which is coal into our final battery grade graphite.

And then coupled to that is the overall demand globally.

Right now, there's about a demand of about 2 million tons per year of graphite for batteries.

We expect that to actually grow maybe to about 3 million tons per year by the end of the decade.

This is a big team effort because it is such a wide river, if you will.

I mean, we're taking coal essentially from the ground, and then we're processing that through to a synthetic graphite that we're then integrating that graphite into electrodes and fabricating batteries.

Then we're testing those batteries over cycling and so forth.

So my group here is, is, is really a team effort to do all that and to make that happen here in a unique way.

At the UK center for Applied Energy Research.

>> Some big Kentucky names from Rosemary Clooney to Man O war pop up.

As our Toby Gibbs looks back at this Week in Kentucky history.

>> The first steamboat traveled on the big Sandy River on May 20th, 1837.

It went 90 miles from Catlettsburg to Prestonsburg and hauled goods for local merchants.

The Canadian government arrested Kentuckian and Confederate sympathizer Luke P Blackburn on May 19th, 1865, accusing him in a conspiracy to kill President Abraham Lincoln by sending him clothing contaminated with yellow fever.

[MUSIC] Blackburn was elected governor of Kentucky in 1879.

Lexington's Blackburn Correctional Complex is named after him.

Fire destroyed a complete city block in downtown Lexington on May 21st, 1917, including the Oddfellows Merrick Lodge.

The fire began in a livery stable and spread to a warehouse, storing powder and shells.

[MUSIC] Man O war won the Preakness on May 18th, 1920, and he would go on to win the Belmont Stakes.

He didn't run in the Kentucky Derby because owner Samuel Riddle didn't like running a young horse for a mile and a quarter.

James Steve Morehead was born May 24th, 1797, in Shepherdsville.

He would become governor of Kentucky in 1834.

The first native born Kentuckian to serve as governor.

[MUSIC] And happy birthday to music legend Rosemary Clooney.

Born in Maysville on May 23rd, 1928.

And that's what happened this week in Kentucky history.

I'm Toby Gibbs.

>> All right.

Thank you.

Toby.

We hope to see you again back here tomorrow night at 630 eastern, 530 central for Kentucky Edition, where we inform, connect and inspire its primary election day.

Of course, full election results tomorrow night as well.

Have a good evening.