Four Senate hopefuls laid out competing conservative visions for Kentucky’s future as the 2026 race to succeed Mitch McConnell heats up.
The republican candidates for the 2026 U.S. Senate race spoke at the Kenton County Republican Party Fall Fest on Saturday. The U.S. Senate race is one to watch in 2026 because McConnell, who first took office in 1985, has said he will not seek reelection in 2026.
A U.S. Senator from Kentucky is elected by the statewide vote, not by district or county; therefore, Boone, Kenton, and Campbell counties all vote on the same senatorial contest. The four candidates seeking the Republican nomination in the May, 19, 2026 primary election are Daniel Cameron, Michael Faris, Nate Morris and Andy Barr.
Whoever wins the primary will face the Democratic nominee in the general election on Nov. 5, 2026.
Daniel Cameron is a former Kentucky Attorney General who served from 2019 to 2023 and was the 2023 Republican nominee for governor. He lost to Andy Beshear in the general election.
During Cameron’s remarks on Saturday, he said he entered the U.S. Senate race out of concern for his family and future generations. Cameron said he wants America to be a nation based on excellence, intelligence and integrity, not DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) principles.
“I’ve certainly been grateful to travel across the state over multiple campaigns to talk about the ideals that I think most of us hold in common, which is that we want a country that is based and built on merit and opportunity,” Cameron said. “I think about what the left has been trying to do here recently is to destroy merit and opportunity and replace it with diversity, equity and inclusion, and it is a progressive ideology that pervades absolutely everything.”
Cameron highlighted “radical common sense” as a guiding principle for his campaign, echoing President Trump’s call to restore it. Cameron defined common sense as opposing men competing in women’s sports, ensuring that only American citizens are counted in the U.S. census and standing firmly with law enforcement.
Cameron called for strong support of police, warning against “defund the police” movements. He compared Kentucky’s respect for law enforcement to the decline of New York City’s safety, referencing past leadership under Rudy Giuliani (107th mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001) and current efforts to “reimagine” policing as misguided.
Cameron advocated for protecting coal and natural gas industries as essential to America’s energy independence and economic competitiveness. He said that if the U.S. does not lead in emerging technologies like AI and blockchain, China will, which could undermine transparency and accountability.
Michael Faris is a business owner and U.S. Air Force veteran from Elizabethtown, Kentucky.
Faris began his remarks on Saturday with a personal story that led him to run for U.S. Senate.
Faris recounts his confrontation with the TSA and major airlines over mask mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic. He said a mental health condition prevented him from wearing a mask and that he had a medical exemption. Despite this, the airlines rejected it, and he was placed on the TSA’s “quad S” list, a category he describes as akin to a terrorist watch list.
Faris said he decided to sue the TSA, the CDC, and major airlines, arguing that they violated his constitutional rights. He said this experience highlights what he sees as government overreach and judicial bias against ordinary citizens. A central theme of Faris’s speech is accountability for the federal judiciary.
Another theme of Faris’s was the call for term limits for Congress, saying that many lawmakers have remained in power for decades and have lost touch with ordinary Americans. Although he said Congress is unlikely to vote to limit itself, he said the country’s founders intended for citizens, not career politicians, to serve temporarily and return home.
“I think the only way to fix that is to bring citizen legislators in, and let us go back to the founding documents, the simple documents and rule based on those principles and to be guided by, obviously, faith and constitutional law, which was created from the Commandments from the Bible,” Faris said.
Lastly, Faris said Saturday that there are failures in the health care system, criticizing large insurance companies for overcharging and underdelivering while politicians fail to hold them accountable.
Faris said he supports Health Savings Accounts, also known as HSAs, and the American Health Care Act (2017). He said that expanding HSAs would allow individuals to invest directly in their own health care and potentially build personal savings for retirement.
Nate Morris is an entrepreneur in the waste management industry from Morgan County.
A focus of Morris’s remarks on Saturday was his criticism of career politicians.
Morris said he met Vice President J.D. Vance about a decade ago, and they bonded over their similar upbringings. In 2023, Vance encouraged him to consider running for the U.S. Senate, noting that McConnell might retire. Morris initially said he hesitated because he was focused on his business and his family, but Vance and Charlie Kirk persuaded him that the country needed outsiders who would support President Trump and reject career politicians.
Morris criticized McConnell, saying he has betrayed conservative values and Trump by blaming him for January 6 and opposing his nominees. He said that McConnell represents a failed political establishment that has dominated Kentucky for over 40 years.
“If you want something that stands with MAGA (Make America Great Again) and stands with our president, and that’s willing to shake it up and provide a new perspective, an outsider’s perspective, and someone who’s not a career politician who doesn’t need the job, that’s what our campaign is all about,” Morris said.
Morris said his campaign represents a fight against corruption and complacency within both parties.
A major focus of the speech was illegal immigration, which Morris calls an “invasion” under President Biden. He called for a total moratorium on new immigration until all illegal immigrants are deported.
Morris also opposed the country’s involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war, saying it was a consequence of weak leadership under President Biden. He criticized McConnell and others for supporting funding to Ukraine and insists that America should focus on peace and domestic prosperity, not “globalist wars.”
Morris also expressed concern about the $37 trillion national debt and said that fiscal responsibility has disappeared from political discourse.
Andy Barr is a native of Lexington and is the current representative for Kentucky’s 6th congressional district, a position he’s held since 2013.
Barr began his speech on Saturday by discussing his political career and his alignment with Trump.
Barr said since being elected, he has been fighting against “big government” and Democratic leadership like Nancy Pelosi (former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives) and Hakeem Jeffries (current Minority Leader of the U.S House of Representatives.) In 2024, Barr said Trump asked him to serve as chairman of his presidential campaign in Kentucky.
“What we need is someone who is a proven winner, someone who has won the tough races, who has represented the swing district, who has flipped a seat, who has defeated Democrats, who’s been in the fight and defeated Nancy Pelosi’s money machine,” Barr said.
Barr said his role in fighting the “war on coal”, voting for Trump’s tax cuts, and helping to secure investment in manufacturing, such as the Corning plant in Mercer County, which produces Gorilla Glass for iPhones. He credits those policies for creating billions in economic growth and local jobs.
Barr also discussed his commitment to border security, stating that he repeatedly voted with Trump to fund the border wall, support border patrol agents, and secure the southern border. Because of this, he says, he has earned the endorsement of the Border Patrol Council.
Barr said one of his legislative achievements was leading the fight against environmental, social, and governance investing, also known as ESG, and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion mandates in the financial sector. His bill requiring asset managers to prioritize financial performance and shareholder returns over political goals became the first piece of legislation President Biden vetoed during his presidency.
As the father of two daughters, Barr said he is proud to have authored the Defending Girls in Athletics Act, which would withhold federal funding from schools that allow biological males to compete in girls’ sports.
Barr said that he is not just talking about supporting Trump, he is actively doing it every day through legislation, leadership and campaign work.
