COVINGTON, Kentucky — When interviewed earlier this month about why he was challenging Republican Rep. Thomas Massie in a primary for his suburban House seat come June, Todd McMurtry cited Massie’s devotion to his libertarian ideology. The congressman, McMurtry said, was putting those ideas over the needs of the district.

Massie, who has been dubbed "Mister No" by Washington reporters for his stubborn habit of opposing bipartisan legislation, drew national attention Friday when he forced a number of House members to return to Washington because of his opposition to the coronavirus relief bill. Massie attempted to force a recorded vote — a request that required a quorum (216 members) be present.

“I came here to make sure our republic doesn’t die by unanimous consent in an empty chamber,” he said, requesting the recorded vote.

Endangering their own lives and going against experts' recommendations, enough members made themselves present that they were able to block Massie’s request and pass the bill by voice vote.

“This is exactly why I decided to challenge him," said McMurtry. "He practices a selfish agenda. He's this pure libertarian ideologue, and that's all he really cares about. And he puts his agenda ahead of the agenda of the people here in the district. There's a lot of hardworking Kentuckians that would like to have a congressman that was responsive and adhering to their needs in the district and not more interested in adhering to his ideologies.”

Todd McMurtry poses for a portrait in his Covington, Kentucky home on February 22. (Photo by Michael Rayne Swensen / for the Washington Examiner)

When Massie announced that he would vote against the $2 trillion package, it earned him a Twitter slam from President Trump Friday morning.

McMurtry said he agrees with Trump's tweets, which called Massie a “third rate Grandstander” who “just wants the publicity” and should be thrown out of the Republican Party.

“I agree with the president's tweets," he said. "I think that what Massie did was selfish and detrimental to the good of the nation. And we just don't need that. Not now, not with the massive pandemic. That's real — sweeping across the country. We don't want to be Italy or China. We want to be South Korea, and we don't want our economy to tank. We want it to thrive once we're past this. We want a V-shape recovery, not a U-shape recovery,” he said.

McMurtry’s run marks the first time anyone has challenged Massie since he first won his seat in 2012.

In 2019, Massie had been the only member of the Republican Party to vote against a resolution in the House of Representatives condemning the anti-Israel BDS movement. McMurtry said that's what originally made him consider entering the race.

“I've always known that he's ineffective and odd," said McMurtry. "What got to me in the summer, though, was that he was the only member of the Republican Party to vote against the BDS resolution in the U.S. House of Representatives. So I said, 'What the heck is that? That's crazy.'"

"His record on Israel is atrocious," McMurtry added. "I don't know that he's ever cast a vote to support Israel. He even refused to vote against President Obama’s Iran deal."

In 2015, Massie was the only lawmaker in the House who did not take a side in the Iran nuclear agreement — he instead voted present.

McMurtry also cited other foreign policy votes where he believes Massie is out of step. "I saw that he voted against the resolution to support the freedom fighters in Hong Kong," he said. "And then shortly after that, there was another bill to make a resolution against China with regard to their treatment of the Uighur Muslims. I just thought that that was just unconscionable. So I went on social media, and I basically said, 'This is not acceptable. You have to have somebody better.' After I did that, people started to send me messages and said, 'Well, why don't you run?' And the next thing I knew, I was running."

McMurtry, a former city councilman and city attorney from Fort Wright, gained local fame more recently when he represented Covington Catholic High School student Nicholas Sandmann in his lawsuits against several network and cable news outlets.

“I've brokered some pretty big deals over the years that are of valuable public interest," he told me. "In other words, things that have improved the community by being able to negotiate and make legal, complex, real estate, and other types of deals."

McMurtry described his district as quiet amid the quarantine, on the edge of economic peril, and ill-served by Massie's opposition to the relief package. "All these people are out of a job, and he's playing with the rules of procedure in the House, trying to delay them getting much-needed support from the government," McMurtry said. "And as usual — I don't know what the exact phrase is — 'don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.' If it's not perfect, he's not for it, so nothing ever gets done in his way of doing things, and that is unacceptable to me.”

Disclosure: McMurtry is a client of Brad Todd, who co-authored The Great Revolt with Salena Zito.