COLUMBUS — Former President Donald Trump arrived at the Georgia GOP Convention in Columbus Saturday afternoon, making his first campaign speech since being indicted on 37-counts of mishandling government documents, making false statements and conspiracy to commit obstruction.

Trump is set to be arraigned in a Florida courtroom Tuesday, the first U.S. president or former president to be indicted on criminal charges.

The 2024 presidential frontrunner said he was not deterred from his mission of seeking an endorsement from the Georgia Republican Party, seeming jovial as he exited “Trump Force One” at the Columbus Airport, while dancing and taking pictures with fans.

Trump was welcomed at the convention, as he entered to Lee Greenwood’s “I’m Proud to be an American,” where delighted Republican delegates cheered him on, chanting “USA.”

Trump began by thanking the record-breaking crowd of more than 2,000 delegates who turned out for his campaign speech and Immediate Past Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party, David Shafer, for his leadership the last several years.

Trump said that together he and the Republican Party can stand up to what he called “extremists, Marxists, radicals, RHINOS and crooked Department of Justice” who he said have plagued the country the past three years.

“Every time I fly over a blue state, I get a subpoena,” he joked.

However, he then turned solemn, saying he has put everything on the line and has not yielded to what he called “the corrupt political establishment.”

“I will never stop fighting,” he said. “I didn’t need any of this. I had a great life, but we are going to make America great again.”

In order to “make America great again” Trump insisted Republicans must vote out what he called the current corrupt government, which he alleged had opened the borders and “squandered our blood and treasure” on endless wars.

Trump reflected on his campaign run in 2020, claiming people said his personality would cause wars.

“It turns out it’s my personality that made people not want to fight us,” Trump said laughing.

Trump contrasted his time in office to the current situation, alleging that Afghanistan is currently the largest exporter of military goods, selling everything the U.S. gave them, while the U.S. focuses on what he called gender and imported goods.

“Our country is no longer respected,” he said. “Three years ago, our country was respected more than ever before. Today, we don’t even have any ammunition; Ukraine has all our ammunition. When I was president, we were stuffed to the guild with ammunition.”

Trump insisted that what he called his “impeccable performance” as Commander-in-Chief, along with his “strong economic policy” made him the “perfect president.” He claimed that the only logical explanation behind not winning a second-term was election interference; Numerous investigations, audits and failed lawsuits alleging election fraud and ballots, however, have dispelled Trump’s false accusations.

Trump pointed back to polls that said he was up by 17 points in the 2020 election, before eventually losing to Biden.

“We didn’t lose,” Trump alleged without evidence. He falsely said, “We won by a lot. We would come here for rallies and fill up the place with 40-50,000 people, but they (Democrats) couldn’t even fill up a base and then at the end I hear he just clipped you.”

Trump claimed politicians told him it was impossible to win Alabama with record-setting numbers and South Carolina, but lose in Georgia.

“Right now, you (Georgia) has a lunatic, district attorney coming after me over a perfect phone call,” Trump said.

The former president is referring to the call he made in 2020, asserting the results of the Presidential election were rigged.

“I had every right to complain that the election in Georgia was, in my opinion, rigged,” Trump said. “The day you’re not allowed to complain about an election is the day you are Communist China.”

Trump’s telephone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is part of a special grand jury investigation into election interference with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis expected to make an announcement about whether he will be indicted by mid August.

Trump was met with a huge round of applause from delegates.

Trump did eventually acknowledge the federal indictment, calling it the “most horrific abuse of power in the history of our country.” He claimed the documents were well within his power to hold onto, due to the Presidential Records Act.

He reminisced on his move back to Mar-a-Lago, when he sat the boxes on the White House sidewalk, where reportedly “everyone was taking pictures.”

“This isn’t someone smuggling boxes out,” Trump said. “This is someone placing boxes on the sidewalk and waiting for a truck to come and pick them up. If this is a spy operation, we did a very bad job.”

Trump asserted that he, like many presidents before him, was in the midst of negotiating with the National Archives when Mar-a-Lago was raided by what he called “gun-toting FBI agents.”

“Meanwhile, Biden has droves of records from when he was Vice-President,” Trump told the crowd. “He even has documents from his time as a Senator, and Senators are not allowed to bring home classified documents.”

According to media reports, classified documents were found by Biden’s staff at an office outside of the Capitol and at his personal residence; However, unlike Trump, Biden and his team surrendered the documents after they were discovered. The justice department claims that Trump repeatedly impeded efforts by the government to take back classified documents from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

However, Trump claimed he is willing for the Department of Justice to go after him for the sake of the country.

“We need to drain the swamp and no one else is going to do it, so I have to do it,” he said.

Trump currently leads Joe Biden in national polls 44 percent to 38 percent, as reported in a survey by the Washington Post and ABC News.

But, no win is guaranteed.

With that, Trump asked for the GOP’s vote.

“With your vote, we will take back our country and absolutely make America great again,” he cheered.

Trump was met with a standing ovation, as he then headed to North Carolina to deliver a speech.