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US President Donald Trump arrives on stage to speak at his campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Photo: AP

Published: 9:41am, 21 Jun 2020Updated: 8:29pm, 21 Jun 2020

Controversy surrounded US President Donald Trump on multiple fronts on Saturday, as he led a campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a Midwestern city scarred by the massacre a century ago of hundreds of its black residents.

The rally happened a day after Juneteenth, a holiday that commemorates the emancipation of black Americans.

Tensions were already running high over Trump’s choice of the campaign rally’s place and time, as health authorities warned against holding an event that had been expected to draw as many as 100,000 people, when the president’s campaign announced that six of its members working at the rally had tested positive for Covid-19.

Trump had boasted earlier in the week that there had been nearly a million ticket requests for his big event. But there were thousands of empty seats in the 20,000-capacity BOK Centre, many of them in the upper deck of the venue. Supporters – most without masks - and hundreds of protesters filled streets Saturday around the stadium.

“You are warriors, thank you,” Trump said to his audience.