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Live CNN Segment Captures Chaotic Moment at Trump Rally

Around five different protests disrupted the event.

CNN cameras captured the moment a protester was aggressively ejected from a Donald Trump campaign rally.

The president was in North Carolina to stump for former RNC chair and Senate hopeful Michael Whatley, who is trailing in the polls.

But a handful of protesters interrupted his rally in Greenville. Reports suggest up to five people were thrown out of the rally site, Pitt-Greenville Airport.

The protester is manhandled by security.

The protester is manhandled by security.

CNN

During one ejection, CNN cameras were rolling during a segment about the Nov. 3 midterm elections. Anderson Cooper asked reporter Kristen Holmes why Trump would bother campaigning for Whatley when the race seemed like a “lost cause.”

“No one can answer that question, why is he here?” Holmes said, noting that the Republican Senate Super PAC pulled out weeks ago. “They seem to know they are far too far behind.”

She said she was told the 80-year-old president felt loyal to Whatley.

At that moment, Anderson Cooper 360 was interrupted by a protester being “violently” ejected.

Security officers escort out a protestor as US President Donald Trump speaks at a midterm campaign rally at Pitt-Greenville Airport in Greenville, North Carolina, on October 20, 2026. (Photo by Kent NISHIMURA / AFP via Getty Images)

Security officers escort a protester out of Pitt-Greenville Airport in Greenville, North Carolina, on October 20.

KENT NISHIMURA/AFP via Getty Images

A protestor shouts as US President Donald Trump speaks at a midterm campaign rally at Pitt-Greenville Airport in Greenville, North Carolina, on October 20, 2026. (Photo by Kent NISHIMURA / AFP via Getty Images)

Another protester shouts as Donald Trump speaks.

KENT NISHIMURA/AFP via Getty Images

Boos preceded chants of “USA! USA!” as Holmes said: “I think right now we’re actually getting another protester. This is about the fourth or fifth protester, and this is actually getting a little bit violent there.”

The cameras cut to the scuffle, with cops and security shoving the woman.

“You can see that they were fighting and pushing her back,” Holmes says. She added that there had been four or five different protests that evening.

A security officer escorts out a protestor as US President Donald Trump speaks at a midterm campaign rally at Pitt-Greenville Airport in Greenville, North Carolina, on October 20, 2026. (Photo by Kent NISHIMURA / AFP via Getty Images)

A female protester is ejected.

KENT NISHIMURA/AFP via Getty Images

“You can see her screaming here. I‘m not sure entirely what she‘s protesting there, but there have been a various number of them. You can hear President Trump; he’s been calling them names, calling them losers. Unsurprising there. But this is what we’ve seen overall throughout all of these different stops,” Holmes added.

After another protester was ejected, Trump joked about being violent with them. “A long time ago, I said, if you want, BEAT THE HELL OUT OF THEM!” he said as the man was whisked away.

“I don’t say that anymore,” he added, laughing: “Don’t hurt him!”

The Independent reported that he then “mimicked wanting to punch them.”

The problems started early in the event on Tuesday evening, when two people heckled him in quick succession. Violence was on his mind.

A protestor yells at US President Donald Trump as he speaks at a midterm campaign rally at Pitt-Greenville Airport in Greenville, North Carolina, on October 20, 2026. (Photo by Kent NISHIMURA / AFP via Getty Images)

Another protester yells at Donald Trump.

KENT NISHIMURA/AFP via Getty Images

“They get home, and they get smacked in the face by the mother and the father, maybe a little harder by the father. And they say, ‘We voted for that man. We love that man. You did that — how disgraceful,’” Trump responded.

“They get paid by the radical left lunatics that you watch taking place in France,” Trump added.

French President Emmanuel Macron blamed the violence in his country on “seditionists from far-left fringe groups, joined by many criminals,” during his national address Sunday.

According to the Associated Press, the fifth ejected protester said: “Gas is too expensive.”

Trump’s event was otherwise marked by a bizarre tangent in which he lusted over the body of his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump. “She’s an extremely fit young woman. Have you ever seen her exercise?” he said.

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“She’s so fit it’s ridiculous,” he added. “But she’s also fit up here,” Trump said while pointing to his head.

Michael Whatley and Lara Trump worked together at the Republican National Committee ahead of the 2024 election cycle.

Trump also drifted into a now-familiar ode to the physique of Ohio Sen. Jon Husted, one he has delivered at three rallies this month.

In Greenville, Trump recalled inviting Husted onstage at an earlier event. “So he’s over here, I’m over here, and I’m studying his body. I’ve never studied the body of a man before; it’s not my thing,” he said.

“Nothing wrong with it, of course. Nothing. … But it’s never been my thing, to be honest with you. But I looked at his a--, and then I looked at his legs… It’s like a pile of muscle.”

“Then I looked at his legs, and I said, man, his feet are big. Then I looked at his shoulders, and I tapped him on the shoulder and it actually hurt my hand. It was like a piece of steel,” Trump said. “I said, this guy’s a monster.”

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