Trump, Vance in Atlanta: Rally attendance, Kemp attacks, Kamala Harris, Laken Riley

ATLANTA - Former President Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, visited Atlanta on Saturday for their first joint rally in Georgia. The event began at 3 p.m. at the Georgia State University Convocation Center.

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Their visit followed Vice President Kamala Harris's rally at the same venue on Tuesday night, marking her first appearance since President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the 2024 presidential race.

Vance landed at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport at around 3:30 p.m., before heading to GSU.

Trump followed suit, landing at the Atlanta airport at 4 p.m.

At the same time, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene took the stage at their rally, maintaining her belief that the 2020 election was "stolen from Georgia." She slammed Kamala Harris, who has reportedly secured enough votes from delegates to become the Democratic nominee.

READ MORE: Could Kamala Harris beat Donald Trump? Here’s what the polls say

"We've seen Kamala Harris stand side-by-side Joe Biden, the dementia-ridden president, and destroy America for nearly four years now. It's a shame," she said.

Vance took the stage at around 4:30 p.m.

Before making an appearance at the rally, Trump held a roundtable to meet up with local Black business owners and discuss how inflation was affecting them.

Trump supporters turned away from Atlanta rally, he claims

Trump made it to the podium just after 6 p.m., saying he wasn't sure he would send anyone to attend Georgia State University after alleging some of his supporters were refused entry to his rally.

"The state was terrific, and the fire marshal, I will say, could not have been better. Thank you to the fire marshal. But the school administration stopped us from getting another 5 or 600, even a thousand people in. Thousands of people were told no," Trump claimed. "I'm not sure if I'm going to be sending anybody to this school. I'm not happy about it. If they're going to stand in the way of admitting people to our rally, just imagine what they're going to do on Election Day."

FOX 5 Atlanta reached out to GSU for comment, but has not yet heard back.

Trump slams Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp

Throughout his speech, Trump took jabs at Gov. Brian Kemp who he said he helped get elected by endorsing him when he ran against Democrat Stacey Abrams for office.

"Kemp is very bad for the Republican Party," Trump said. "He's a disloyal guy, and he's a very average governor."

At one point, Trump ripped into him for over 10 minutes straight, ridiculing the governor for not helping him beat Joe Biden during the 2020 election.

"I got this guy nominated. I, then, got him elected. Without me, he doesn't get nominated, and he doesn't get elected. He had no chance of winning either one. And all he had to do is sign something where the Senate would like to look at election integrity," Trump said. "And this bad guy said, ‘I’m sorry, sir. I can't do it.'"

Kemp took to social media to tell Trump that he would not engage in "petty personal insults":

"My focus is on winning this November and saving our country from Kamala Harris and the Democrats - not engaging in petty personal insults, attacking fellow Republicans, or dwelling on the past / You should do the same, Mr. President, and leave my family out of it."

Georgia a battleground state in the 2024 election

Georgia remains a crucial battleground state, with Republicans hopeful that Biden's waning popularity, combined with concerns over inflation and immigration, will benefit them in the upcoming election. However, recent Democratic gains have made the political landscape resemble 2020, when Biden narrowly won the state.

"Black turnout was very high in 2020. If that goes down or if Trump is able to win some of the Black voters in Atlanta and across the state, that's going to really increase his chance of winning here in the state," said Zachary Peskowitz, an associate professor of political science at Emory University. 

The Harris campaign, along with Georgia Democratic officials, has established 24 offices across the state, including two new ones in metro Atlanta. Meanwhile, Trump and the Republican National Committee have only recently opened their first offices in Georgia. 

"If Trump loses Georgia it's going to be very hard for him to win. The Democrats have some more paths even if they do lose Georgia. But they definitely have quite a bit of ground to make up to win Georgia," said Peskowitz.

Democrats are aiming for high turnout among traditional Democratic voters, strong support in the suburbs, and small gains in other areas to secure a win for Harris in Georgia. This strategy was evident at recent Democratic office openings. 

"It has some elements that are very positive, like the low unemployment and then others that aren't. So, the high inflation and cost of living that we've experienced over the last couple of years," said Peskowitz.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, stated that strong GOP campaigns can win comfortably in Georgia, but weak efforts can lead to losses against strong Democratic campaigns. Kemp won reelection by 7.5 percentage points over Democrat Stacey Abrams in 2022, while Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock defeated his Republican challenger, Herschel Walker, endorsed by Trump. 

"Many highly educated suburban voters, many of them white, they switched from voting Republican to Democratic, so Trump really struggled about affluent educated suburban Atlanta voters," said Peskowitz.

In recent elections, Democrats have held significant advantages in metro Atlanta, as well as in Columbus, Savannah, and several rural, majority-Black counties. Conversely, Republicans have maintained dominance in other rural areas, small towns, and cities where Trump has held multiple rallies in recent years.

Laken Riley and the Trump-Vance rally 

In announcing the rally, the Trump campaign referenced the death of Laken Riley, a Georgia nursing student who was murdered earlier this year at the University of Georgia. A Venezuelan immigrant has been charged with her murder. Trump had previously mentioned Riley during his acceptance speech for the Republican Party's presidential nomination, describing her as a "brilliant 22-year-old nursing student." He criticized the Biden administration, blaming Riley's death on what he described as the Democrats' immigration policies. 

"Yet another American life was stolen by a criminal alien set free by this administration," Trump said at the Republican National Convention. "Tonight, America, this is my vow. I will not let these killers and criminals into our country."

Trump vows to ‘keep men out of women’s sports'

During the rally, Donald Trump vowed that he would sign a conservative executive order "on day one" to keep schools from teaching "critical race theory, transgender insanity, and other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content onto the shoulders of our children."

"I will not give one penny to any school that has a vaccine mandate or a mask mandate," Trump said. "And I will keep men out of women's sports, if that's okay."

Trump, likely alluding to the Olympic boxing match in which Algerian boxer Imane Khelif won her first match against Italian boxer Angela Carini, when Carini abandoned the fight after just 46 seconds.

Last year, the International Boxing Association claimed Khelif had elevated levels of testosterone. The claim and match stirred public debate over whether Khelif should be considered a male or even transgender.

"You look at what's happening over in Paris, it will never happen here," Trump said. "I will never it happen."