(José Niño, Headline USA) Ed Gallrein, a former Navy captain with President Donald Trump’s endorsement, is running against Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., Republican primary on Tuesday, but he has refused to appear at any debates and has disclosed almost nothing about himself apart from his claimed affiliation with SEAL Team Six.
Ken Klippenstein’s Substack has released an investigative report that scrutinizes Gallrein’s campaign approach, his remarks in public settings, and a chapter from his life after the military that he has never brought up while campaigning.
Gallrein skipped every scheduled debate, leaving Massie to show up by himself each time. He has sat for only a handful of interviews. His campaign promotes endorsements from military officers whose identities are blacked out. Asked about the Iran War’s impact on gas prices, Gallrein responded to a local NBC affiliate that “the president is playing five-dimensional chess,” according to Klippenstein’s reporting.
Ed Gallrein, a former member of SEAL Team 6, says of operator culture: "There's a lot of fractures — we had an extremely high divorce rate."
Full story on who Gallrein is and what this race means: https://t.co/Z1Vu2xghMT pic.twitter.com/daSSaD75Ld
— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) May 18, 2026
The next day on the Mark Levin Show, he upgraded his description of Trump’s war management to “nine-dimensional chess.” At the heart of Gallrein’s appeal is an anecdote he shares about a visit to the Oval Office, during which he claims Trump had a leather binder holding his entire classified career record.
“He knows everything about me. He knows what I did for you in uniform. He knows what I’ll do for you in Washington. I’ll be your champion,” Gallrein declared to a crowd at the Maywood Country Club, as reported by Klippenstein.
Across several public appearances that Klippenstein documented, Gallrein has cited classification rules when questioned about his history, asserting that he is barred from discussing operations or specifics of his service. He has also referred to civilians as “sheep” and special operators as “sheep dogs.” “SEALs are sheep dogs. We don’t care what letter jacket the adversary wears. If they’re bad people and they mean, mean harm to our sheeps, we’re on it,” Gallrein stated on a podcast called USA Cares.
Klippenstein’s investigation also uncovers a moment from Gallrein’s career after leaving the Navy. Following his retirement, Gallrein took a position as a Safety and Security Specialist at the Department of Energy’s Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, a facility handling sensitive nuclear work. The department terminated him in May 2013.
Ed Gallrein likens Trump to Jesus.
"The second thing I'll tell you about him: he's just as kind as the Good Shepherd." pic.twitter.com/ok0izV4ADx
— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) May 18, 2026
Gallrein submitted a whistleblower complaint claiming he faced retaliation for flagging problems with security training programs, but officials rejected the complaint. The ruling noted that Gallrein had raised his concerns with a fellow subcontractor employee instead of reporting them to a DOE official or following his employer’s required chain of command. Gallrein has avoided any mention of this incident throughout his campaign.
Massie, the sitting congressman, has built a track record of bucking his party’s leadership on multiple fronts. He opposed Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” joined forces with Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., to demand the release of the Epstein files, and has emerged as one of Congress’s loudest critics of the Iran War. Trump has branded Massie “the worst Republican Congressman in History” and thrown his support behind Gallrein.
José Niño is the deputy editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/JoseAlNino
