Former President Donald Trump has made some wild claims about President Joe Biden, accusing him of waging a "conspiracy to overthrow the United States of America".
Speaking in Greensboro, North Carolina, ahead of Super Tuesday's primaries, Trump ramped up his immigration rhetoric. Trump is known for turning attack lines back on his rivals to lessen their impact.
Biden has labelled Trump a danger to democracy, highlighting Trump's attempts to overturn the 2020 election results. These attempts culminated in the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, when supporters attempted to block the peaceful transition of power after Biden won the election.
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Trump has accused Biden of a 'conspiracy to overthrow the US' (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)In response, Trump has called Biden "the real threat to democracy" and without any evidence, claimed that Biden is behind the charges he faces. On Saturday, Trump took aim at Biden's border policies, stating that "every day Joe Biden is giving aid and comfort to foreign enemies of the United States."
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"Biden's conduct on our border is by any definition a conspiracy to overthrow the United States of America," he claimed. "Biden and his accomplices want to collapse the American system, nullify the will of the actual American voters and establish a new base of power that gives them control for generations."
People have long claimed that Democrats are encouraging illegal immigration to reduce the influence of white voters - a racist conspiracy theory once limited to extreme right-wing groups. They have claimed there has been an intentional push by the US liberal establishment to systematically diminish the influence of white people.
At his rally in Virginia, Trump echoed this theory, saying about the migrants: "They're trying to sign them up to get them to vote in the next election."
Huge crowds turned out for Trump's rally in Greensboro, North Carolina (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)Biden's campaign spokesman Ammar Moussa responded by saying: "Once again Trump is projecting in an attempt to distract the American people from the fact he killed the fairest and toughest border security bill in decades because he believed it would help his campaign. Sad,".
Trump's campaign trail led him to Virginia just three days before Super Tuesday, when 16 states, including North Carolina and Virginia, will hold elections. Thousands of eager supporters gathered for an evening rally in downtown Richmond.
The primaries will be the biggest voting day of the year, leading up to November's general election, which looks set to be a repeat of the 2020 face-off between Trump and Biden. Nikki Haley, Trump's last Republican primary rival, also campaigned in North Carolina. After her event in Raleigh, about 80 miles away, the former UN ambassador was coy about her plans post-Super Tuesday.
"We're going to keep going and we're going to keep pushing," she said, arguing most people in America don't want Biden or Trump to be their leader. Trump focused a large part of his speech on the legal troubles he's facing.
Trump made the remarks as he ramps up his rhetoric ahead of Super Tuesday (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)So far, Trump has successfully turned his legal woes into a rallying cry for supporters in the primary race. But it's not clear if his message of grievance will work with more moderate voters, who will likely be the ones to decide the November election results.
"I stand before you today not only as your past and hopefully future president, but as a proud political dissident and a public enemy of a rogue regime," Trump declared. He railed against what he calls an "anti-Democratic machine."
At both of his rallies, Trump played 'Justice for All' - a version of the Star-Spangled Banner that he collaborated on with a group of defendants jailed over their alleged roles in the January 2021 insurrection, who he refers to as "hostages". As Trump gears up for the big election, he's painted an apocalyptic vision of the country under Biden's command.
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Trump has particularly taken aim at the Biden administration's handling of immigration, which was the animating issue of his 2016 campaign. He has once again seized on this topic as the US has faced a record influx of migrants at the border.
On Thursday, both Trump and Biden visited the US-Mexico border to highlight their contrasting approaches to the issue. On Saturday, Trump conjured up images of Biden turning "public schools into migrant camps" and "the USA into a crime-ridden, disease-ridden dumping ground, which is what they're doing."
People queued for blocks to get into hear Trump speak (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)He also talked about the tragic murder of Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student. Her alleged killer is a man from Venezuela who entered the US illegally and was allowed to stay while his immigration case was being sorted out.
Studies have shown that native-born US residents are more likely to have been arrested for violent crimes than people in the country illegally. However, this hasn't stoped Trump from seizing on several high-profile incidents, including a recent video of a group of migrants brawling with police in Times Square.
"Not one more innocent American life should be lost to migrant crime," Trump said. Trump, who often criticises Biden's intelligence and mental sharpness, has been sensitive to questions over his own mental competence after mixing up Haley with Nancy Pelosi and Biden with former president Barack Obama at previous rallies.
Lately, Trump has tried to stop any questions by insisting he mixes up the names on purpose. Early into his appearance in Virginia, he claimed: "I do that because you know that makes a point. Do we understand that, right? Because a lot of people say he's running the country. I don't personally think so."
However, over an hour into his speech, he seemed to confuse Obama and Biden again, saying: "Putin, you know, has so little respect for Obama that he's starting to throw around the 'nuclear' word."
Trump turned his attention to immigration at his rallies (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)North Carolina and Virginia are both key states for Super Tuesday and are also on Trump's radar for November. Trump has won North Carolina twice before but saw his winning margin get smaller.
Biden's campaign is already working hard in the state, hoping to win it for the first time since 2008. Virginia used to be a swing state but has been leaning towards the Democrats for some years now, with Trump having lost there twice.
However, a senior adviser from Trump's campaign said on Saturday that he thinks "we could make Virginia competitive." In North Carolina, there was a party-like atmosphere at the Greensboro Coliseum Complex before Trump's rally.
Fans queued up in a line that wound its way through metal barriers and stretched hundreds of yards from the arena. Cars with number plates from North Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee filled the car park, many flying Trump, US, and Confederate flags.
"We just love Trump," said Mary Welborn, who lives nearby in Thomasville. She expressed her frustration at the legal actions against the former president, saying: "The way he's being treated is insane. No other president has been treated this way,".
In Richmond, fans began queuing up on Saturday morning for a rally in the evening at a city centre convention place. By the middle of the afternoon, the lines to get in stretched over several blocks.
Ken Ballos, who is retired from being a police officer and lives close by in Hanover County, shared that he picked Trump in both 2016 and 2020. He's quite excited about the chance of Trump going up against Biden again, saying: "Trump would eat him up."
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