The real reason Donald Trump is visiting an Arizona church

If the president is campaigning in the US southwest, writes Andrew Buncombe, he must think the formerly red state is going to be very close in November

Donald Trump vowed to build a wall along entirety of 2,000-mile border but has completed just a short section (Getty)

There are few things that get Donald Trump and his supporters more excited than the wall along the US’s border with Mexico.

Whether it is the fences that have so far been erected under his presidency – around 350km, with the vast majority of them replacing existing structures – those he has promised (more than 800km by early next year), or the more general notion of a barrier against “others”, the president knows he has a ready-fire applause line whenever he mentions it at one of his rallies. He used to brag Mexico would pay for the wall, but recently he’s stopped saying that, apparently in light of Mexico having repeatedly refused to do so.

Little surprise then, about the glee that could be sensed in the president’s voice as he set off to Arizona, first to visit the border at Yuma, then the Dream City Church in Phoenix, where the pastor claimed to have installed an air purification system that would kill “99.9 per cent of Covid-19 within 10 minutes”.