Trump says he regrets endorsing Republican Sen. Ben Sasse in his 2020 reelection bid, calls him 'bad news'

• Former President Trump said he should "never" have endorsed Sen. Ben Sasse's 2020 reelection bid.
• Trump made the comments while stumping for Nebraska GOP gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster.

Former President Donald Trump voiced regret for his support of Republican Sen. Ben Sasse's 2020 reelection bid during a Thursday tele-rally, stating he should "never" have given the endorsement to the conservative Nebraska lawmaker, according to The Hill.

Trump has been critical of Sasse in the past, calling him "the least effective Senate Republican" just days before the 2020 presidential election. The comments came after the senator blasted the then-president during a leaked audio recording where he told constituents that he had "never been on the Trump train."

"He's bad news, Ben Sasse," Trump said during this week's tele-rally. "He begged for my endorsement, the day after he started hitting me and we hit much harder than he knows how to hit."

Trump's remarks came as he rallied support for embattled Nebraska gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster, who is currently facing eight allegations of sexual misconduct — including one from a state lawmaker — as he wards off challenges for the GOP nomination from Jim Pillen, a University of Nebraska regent, and state Sen. Brett Lindstrom.

Herbster has vehemently denied the allegations, which Trump also dismissed, calling Herbster a "fine man" who is "innocent of those despicable charges."

"The fake news and the Washington establishment are doing everything they can to try and stop Charles," the former president said.

Earlier in the week, Trump also traveled to the state to stump for Herbster, where the candidate railed against critical race theory and pushed for the enactment of tax cuts while arguing that sex education should not be a part of schooling.

"We're gonna take sex education out of the schools and put it back in the homes where it belongs," Herbster said during the Sunday rally to the Make America Great Again faithful.

For Trump, his tit-for-tat with Sasse is rooted in a relationship that was never defined by deep political loyalty.

In September 2019, Trump threw his support behind Sasse's 2020 campaign, saying at the time that he'd "done a wonderful job representing the people of Nebraska."

However, Sasse was highly critical of Trump after the January 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol and voted to impeach him for "incitement of insurrection" for his role that day. He was one of seven Republicans to cross over and back impeachment, alongside all 50 Senate Democrats.

And Sasse has long rebuked Trump's claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election, which he outlined in his statement in support of convicting the former president in his second impeachment trial.

"President Trump lied that he 'won the election by a landslide,'" Sasse said at the time. "He lied about widespread voter fraud, spreading conspiracy theories despite losing 60 straight court challenges, many of his losses handed down by great judges he nominated."