Two men have appeared in court in the US over alleged threats to assassinate the Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.
It is claimed the two men planned to kill some 88 people and decapitate 14 African-Americans, before, in a final act, assassinating Senator Obama.
Daniel Cowart, 20, and Paul Schlesselman, 18, were arrested on Wednesday in Tennessee for possession of firearms, threats against a candidate running for president and conspiring to rob a gun store.
The men discussed a ‘killing spree to include targeting a predominantly African-American school,’ Brian Weaks, an agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives told a Memphis court today.
‘They further stated that their final act of violence would be to attempt to kill/assassinate presidential candidate Barack Obama,’ he added, as the two men appeared before the federal court.
The Obama campaign declined to comment on the case.
On the campaign trail, the two candidates attacked each other's economic plans on the final week of campaigning before the election.
Republican nominee John McCain, who is trailing in opinion polls, promised to take steps to restore confidence in the wilting US stock market, keep people in their homes and create jobs if elected on 4 November.
Senator Obama, enjoying a lead in national polls and in many battleground states, said in a speech in Canton, Ohio, that it was time to turn the page from policies pushed by the outgoing Bush administration.
The two candidates were making their case in Ohio, a state that has been critical to Republican presidential victories in the last two elections.
Senator Obama holds a lead in Ohio and in several other states that President George W Bush won in 2004, putting the Arizona senator in a perilous position.
Mr Obama held steady with a 5-point lead over Mr McCain among likely US voters nationally in a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby national tracking poll released today.
Senator McCain said electing Mr Obama would leave a dangerous threesome of Democrats in charge of the US government, including House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, who would need to raise taxes to pay for ambitious spending plans.
He said ‘This election comes down to how you want your hard-earned money spent.'
‘Do you want to keep it and invest it in your future, or have it taken by the most liberal person to ever run for the presidency and the Democratic leaders who have been running Congress for the past two years,’ he said.
