At his Reno rally on Sunday night, Trump falsely claimed that migrants are “charging across the border by the hundreds of thousands” and pledged that “the invasion will end” if he is elected president.

He also promised “the largest deportation operation in American history” before coming up with a grossly inflated number of migrants who crossed the US-Mexico border during the Biden administration (”15 or 16 million people”).

Trump also falsely stated that thousands of Chinese immigrants, mostly men in their 20s, are flooding into the US. “The perfect age for an army,” he said.

For the second night in a row, he recited a song that was written by civil rights activist Oscar Brown in 1963 that later became a hit for soul singer Al Wilson.

Trump, who recites the lyrics as if he’s reading a book to a kindergarten class, claims that “The Snake” is a cautionary tale about allowing immigrants into the US. The song was intended as a civil rights metaphor for white society.

“Does that remind you of anything?” Trump asked the crowd after reading the lyrics.

Trump has not yet invoked his Mein Kampf-echoing statement that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.”

Trump was introduced to the stage in Reno by Nevada’s GOP chair Michael McDonald, who was criminally charged days ago along with five other Republicans in the state for falsely pledging the state’s electoral votes to Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

At least five states have since launched criminal investigations into the fake elector scheme, and prosecutors in two states – Georgia and Michigan – have filed criminal charges against participants.

Trump stepped on the stage roughly one hour and 30 minutes late. It’s his second rally in as many days.

And that number will only get bigger.

Within eight months in 2023 alone, the financial fallout from 2020’s election lies reached more than $935m.

That figure does not include what could be at stake in ongoing lawsuits against Fox News, nor does it include the mounting legal costs surrounding the hundreds of cases connected to the January 6 and the attack on the US Capitol, nor the federal and state-level criminal cases against Trump and his allies for their alleged attempts to overturn 2020 election results, an effort fuelled by the ongoing false narrative that the outcome was stolen from and rigged against him.

Donald Trump is on course for a sweeping victory in the first contest of the 2024 presidential election as he leads his rivals by significant margins in a new poll.

The survey from CBS News, published on Sunday, will be one of the last measures of the Iowa GOP electorate before caucusing begins on 15 January.

Iowans are set to deliver the former president a commanding win, with his nearest competitor trailing him by 36 percentage points.

The Independent’s John Bowden reports:

Nikki Haley, who is challenging the former president for the Republican nomination in 2024, doesn’t want to weigh in on his multiple court cases.

She said that analysing their effects on his campaign would be “wasted energy”.

“I’m gonna let the courts figure that out,” she said. “I mean, the last thing you’re gonna see me do is weigh in or learn the details about any of his court cases because I can’t follow 91 charges.”

After testing his anti-immigrant agenda and increasingly violent rhetoric in his social media, in interviews and on campaign rally stages, Donald Trump returned to New Hampshire on Saturday with a phrase that echoes the pages of Mein Kampf and white supremacist manifestos.

The frontrunner for the Republican nomination for president has accelerated volatile, dehumanising language and embraced his label as a “day one dictator” while his allies and campaign laugh off and reject warnings from political opponents and critics about amplifying fascist language.

After speaking in New Hampshire on Saturday, Donald Trump will speak to supporters in Reno, Nevada at 2pm local time on Sunday, as his campaign mounts an aggressive multi-state push ahead of Republican primary elections early next year.

His campaign also hopes to blunt signs of momentum among his GOP rivals, including Nikki Haley, who is campaigning in Iowa on Sunday.

Trump’s visit to Nevada comes days after the state’s attorney general announced criminal charges against several Trump loyalists, including the state’s GOP chair, for falsely pledging the state’s electoral votes to Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

At least five states have since launched criminal investigations into their subversion, and prosecutors in two states – Georgia and Michigan – have filed criminal charges against participants.

More on the case in Nevada:

US Senator Joe Manchin, who has been mulling a third-party presidential bid, said Americans “should be concerned” about the support around Donald Trump.

Asked by Jake Tapper on CNN’s State of the Union whether Democratic officials should be worried about President Joe Biden’s re-election chances, the senator warned that another Trump presidency could threaten American democracy.

“I think we all should be concerned about the support that Donald Trump has,” he said on Sunday. “And basically, he’s told us who he is. And when a person tells you who they are, you ought to believe them.”

He said a Trump presidency is “not democracy as we know it, it’s not how the country has been able to survive through this experiment of ours for over 230-plus years.”

“And here we are today now being threatened,” he added. “Can democracy survive? We’ve gone through some tough times, Jake.”

Here’s his answer about whether he has a timeline for declaring a third-party candidacy:

The former UN ambassador has been getting attention from the media, donors and political figures. The question of whether her new resources are enough to compete on even ground with the former president remains to be seen, The Independent’s Kelly Rissman reports:

The US Supreme Court is expected to consider a case involving a statute used against hundreds of defendants charged in connection with January 6, which could gum up the works in federal courtrooms in Washington DC.

The nation’s highest court has not yet scheduled oral arguments in a case challenging how the US Department of Justice has relied on the statute.

Prosecutors have charged more than 327 defendants with the crime, which carries a maximum of 20 years in prison, and more than 50 have pleaded guilty to the count, according to CBS News.

Trump was charged with two counts under the obstruction law – conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and obstruction of an official proceeding. He has pleaded not guilty.

More on the case at the Supreme Court: