Midterms 2018: Obama mocks Trump's migrant caravan response, branding deployment of troops a 'political stunt'

'The biggest threat to America — the biggest threat! — is some impoverished refugees a thousand miles away,' former president says, ridiculing Republican rhetoric

Barack Obama has condemned Donald Trump’s pledge to send up to 15,000 troops to the US-Mexico border in response to a migrant caravan.

Branding the move a “political stunt”, the former president mocked the suggestion “the biggest threat to America — the biggest threat! — is some impoverished refugees a thousand miles away”.

Without mentioning him by name, Mr Obama repeatedly criticised Mr Trump’s habit of making false claims - “I believe in fact-based campaigns,” he noted - and of stoking racial and religious tensions.

"We have seen repeated attempts to divide us with rhetoric designed to make us angry and make us fearful," Mr Obama said to a 3,000-strong audience of mostly Democrat supporters in Miami, Florida, on Friday night.

“It’s designed to exploit our history of racial and ethnic and religious division that pits us against one an another – to make us believe that somehow order will be restored if it weren’t just for those folks who don’t look like we look.”

Speaking ahead of the midterms next week, Mr Obama added: "But in four days, Florida, you can be a check on that kind of behaviour."

Mr Obama was flanked by gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum, who faces former congressman and strong Trump backer Ron DeSantis, and senator Bill Nelson, who is being challenged by the outgoing governor, Rick Scott, in Tuesday's elections.

On Mr Trump’s pledge to end birthright citizenship, Mr Obama said: “I’m assuming that they recognise that a president doesn’t get to decide on his who’s an American citizen and who’s not. That’s not how the Constitution of the United States works. That’s not how the Bill of Rights works. That’s not how our democracy works.”

The midterm elections, Mr Obama said, are a ballot on the “character of our country”.

The former president was repeatedly interrupted by hecklers, prompting him to quip: "Why is it that the folks who won the last election are so mad all the time?"

At his own rally in West Virginia, Mr Trump quickly fired back at his White House predecessor.

“I heard President Obama speak today. I had to listen, I was in the plane. I had nothing else to do," Mr Trump said in West Virginia.

Responding to accusations by Mr Obama he was lying about healthcare pledges, Mr Trump hit back, claiming the former president did not keep his promises to voters.

The president said Mr Obama's assertion that "if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor" under the Affordable Care Act proved false. Some Americans were forced to change providers or health plans under the law.

Mr Trump also said "nobody was worse to the press than Obama," after Mr Obama spoke in defence of the First Amendment. "He's talking about how I should be nice to the fake news," Mr Trump said. "No, thank you!"