At his first rally of the 2024 presidential campaign on Saturday, former President Donald Trump offered his support to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., if she were to run for one of Georgia's U.S. Senate seats in 2026.

"Would you like to run for the Senate? I will fight like hell for you," Trump said from the stage at the Waco, Texas, rally, where Greene was in attendance.

What You Need To Know

  • At his first rally of the 2024 presidential campaign on Saturday, former President Donald Trump offered his support to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., if she were to run for one of Georgia's U.S. Senate seats in 2026

  • Greene posted frequently on social media during the rally and participated in interviews with right-wing media outlets, but did not publicly respond to the former president’s remarks

  • “They have to get tougher, but they cannot take it, these Washington Republicans like Mitch McConnell, who is the absolute worst,” Trump said. “They’ve got to get tougher. They got to get like Marjorie Taylor Greene"

Greene posted frequently on social media during the rally and participated in interviews with right-wing media outlets, but did not publicly respond to the former president’s remarks. Her campaign could not be immediately reached for comment and the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the group that recruits GOP Senate candidates, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The campaign for Sen. Jon Ossof, the Georgia Democrat who is up for reelection in 2026, also did not respond to a request for comment.

Greene has been a staunch Trump ally since before taking office in 2020, becoming one of the most controversy-provoking members of Congress thanks to her penchant for conspiracy theories, an appearance a white nationalist conference, and defense of participants of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Greene later apologized for attending a conference last year hosted by white supremacist Nick Fuentes, though she said she did not regret trying to reach out to that audience. She has apologized for or walked back some inflammatory remarks, including comparing House mask rules to the Holocaust.

Before Trump spoke at the rally, Greene told the crowd about leading a delegation of House Oversight Committee members Friday into the Washington, D.C., jail where some defendants in Jan. 6 prosecutions are being held, calling them “political prisoners” and warning the crowd that law enforcement agencies investigating the former president are not just “coming after President Trump, they’re coming after you.”

“Under Joe Biden, American patriots are being arrested and held in captivity like animals. Look at what’s happening in Washington,” Trump said Saturday. “Marjorie Taylor Greene is the expert. She has been to that prison many times.”

“It’s a hellhole. These are soldiers and policemen and firemen and medics and doctors, in a couple of cases,” Trump added.

Of the approximately 1,000 people charged, about 15% have a background in the military or law enforcement, according to an analysis by NPR. Three active-duty Marines were arrested and charged in January for allegedly forcing their way into the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Greene thanked him on Twitter during the rally for his defense of the pretrial Jan. 6 detainees.

“Thank you for standing up for the J6 political prisoners in the DC Jail, President Trump. The conditions they are suffering are worse than Guantanamo Bay,” she wrote. “We must end the Democrats’ two-tiered justice system!”

In December, at a gala hosted by the New York Young Republican Club, Greene said if she and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon organized the Jan. 6 attack “we would have won” and “it would’ve been armed.” The remarks, widely condemned by members of both parties, were later characterized as a joke by Greene.

Bannon told NBC News in January that Greene “sees herself on the short list for Trump’s VP” in 2024.

Greene also called for the arrest of and echoed the former president’s attacks on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who is investigating Trump for hush money payments allegedly made during the 2016 presidential campaign to women who said they had affairs with the then-candidate.

“He should be arrested. You want to know why?” Greene said in an interview with a right-wing TV broadcast at the rally. “We have to stop allowing the Democrats to abuse us. It’s like we are a beaten spouse.”

Trump also favorably compared Greene to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who plays a key role in the selection and funding of Republican Senate candidates.

“They have to get tougher, but they cannot take it, these Washington Republicans like Mitch McConnell, who is the absolute worst,” Trump said. “They’ve got to get tougher. They got to get like Marjorie Taylor Greene.”