Joe Biden has been forced to pull out of a campaign speech after contracting COVID.

The US president was due to deliver an address to UnidosUS – the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organisation – in Las Vegas later today.

Mr Biden is experiencing mild symptoms, the White House said, including “general malaise” from the infection.

He will return to Delaware to self-isolate and from where he will “continue to carry out all of his duties fully during that time”, Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.

Biden suffering ‘general malaise’: Follow latest on US presidential race

Mr Biden – who is facing mounting pressure to quit the presidential run over his age – wasn’t wearing a mask as he boarded Air Force One from Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas.

Asked by the press how he was feeling, the 81-year-old said: “Good. I feel good.”

He then walked cautiously up the stairs to his plane.

An official said Mr Biden presented this afternoon with upper respiratory symptoms, including a runny nose and a cough.

The president is vaccinated and boosted, they added.

It comes just hours after an interview was published where Mr Biden said he would only consider dropping out of the presidential race, which is set to be a rematch against former Republican president Donald Trump, if he was told to do so because of a medical condition.

Asked by Ed Gordon of BET News whether there was anything which would make him rethink his candidacy for a second term in the White House, Mr Biden said: “If I had some medical condition that emerged, if somebody, if doctors came to me and said, you got this problem and that problem”.

Concerns around Mr Biden’s health have risen since his poor showing in a TV debate with Mr Trump, the Republican nominee.

The president has since insisted he is “firmly committed” to staying in the race.

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