Trump and Biden trade barbs in competing campaigns in swing state of Georgia

Donald Trump and president Joe Biden traded barbs on Saturday as they both campaigned in Georgia, signifying the key role the state may play in November’s general election.

Mr Trump, who faces criminal charges for undermining the 2020 US presidential election in the state, repeatedly insisted falsely that he was the victim of election fraud.

He blasted Georgia district attorney, Fani Willis, who is prosecuting the former US president for interfering with the 2020 election.

“They’re trying to take us out, and it’s not going to work,” Mr Trump told a rally in Rome, Georgia.

He also devoted much of his time to the immigration crisis in the US, blaming Mr Biden for the death of 22-year-old nursing student Laken Riley who was killed last month allegedly by an undocumented immigrant from Venezuela.

During his State of the Union remarks, Mr Biden used the term “illegal” immigrant to refer to Riley’s alleged murderer, to which he apologised on Saturday.

“Joe Biden went on television and apologized for calling Laken’s murderer an illegal...Biden should be apologizing for apologizing to this killer,” Mr Trump said at the rally in Georgia.

Last month, Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student, was attacked and killed while going for a run. She died of blunt force trauma to the head after her killer allegedly used an object to strike her, “disfiguring her skull,” before “dragging” her to a “secluded area”.

Police say her murder came at the hands of murder suspect Jose Antonio Ibarra, the man who was charged on 23 February with malice murder, felony murder, false imprisonment and kidnapping in the case.

Mr Ibarra is not a US citizen and is an undocumented migrant.

The former US president was campaigning in right-wing firebrand