WASHINGTON - President Joe Biden used a dramatic primetime address to the nation on Thursday to warn of the danger to American democracy posed by acolytes of former president Donald Trump and others.

Standing in Philadelphia — the place where America’s founding documents were debated and drafted — Mr Biden warned that those founding ideas of “equality ande democracy” were now under attack.

“Too much of what's happening in our country today is not normal,” he said, adding that Mr Trump and his “Maga Republican” allies represented an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic”.

Mr Trump has continued to rage against an FBI and Justice Department investigation against him in recent days, and in a new interview flirted with the prospect of “full pardons” for January 6 rioters if he is reelected in 2024.