WASHINGTON — President Trump hosted an American citizen in the Oval Office on Saturday night just hours after a delegation led by one of Utah’s senators succeeded in freeing the 26-year-old man from a Venezuelan prison where he had been held for two years without a trial.

The man, Joshua Holt, who had traveled in 2016 to Venezuela to marry a woman he had met online, sat in a yellow chair next to Mr. Trump as the president welcomed him home from what he called a “tough situation.”

Mr. Trump praised Mr. Holt for his bravery and bragged that Mr. Holt was among 17 prisoners in foreign countries that his administration had succeeded in getting released.

“You were a tough one, I have to tell you. That was a tough situation, I have to tell you,” the president said to Mr. Holt, his family and lawmakers from Utah during brief remarks shortly before 9 p.m.