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The suspects were seized in the early morning after police stopped Mr Gartrell, who had been driving a rented Dodge pick-up truck erratically. In the vehicle officers found two high-powered rifles, including one with telescopic sights, along with radios, wigs, a bullet-proof vest, a high-magnification spotting scope, three identifications not belonging to Mr Gartrell, and 44 grams of the stimulant methamphetamine. One rifle had a threaded barrel so that it could be fitted with a silencer.

Also found in their pick-up truck were three kits for the production of methamphetamine and the necessary ingredients.

Mr Johnson, an unemployed lorry driver, told CBS4, the Denver television station, from his cell that his friends had told him that they did not want Mr Obama to be president. “He don’t belong in political office — or blacks don’t belong in political office,” he said. “He gotta be shot.” Mr Johnson continued: “He \ had said that, yes, it would be probably on the day of the acceptance speech.”

He was then asked: “So your friends were saying threatening things about Obama?”

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“Yeah,” Mr Johnson replied. “It sounded like they didn’t want him to be president?”

“Yeah,” Mr Johnson said.

“Do you think they were really plotting to kill Obama?” Mr Johnson replied: “I don’t want to say yes. I don’t want to say no.” He added that he had told the FBI about the plot during eight hours of interviews and a polygraph test. “I did say that it would be from a high vantage point and that it would be with the named rifle,” he said.

After Mr Gartrell’s arrest, officers accompanied him to a hotel, where they arrested Mr Johnson at 4.30am. Thirty minutes later police went to another hotel, where Mr Adolph, 33, wanted on a number of drug-related arrest warrants, jumped from a sixth-storey window and broke his ankle. He was said to be wearing a ring with a swastika.

The men were also reported to have possible ties to an outlaw motorcycle group called Sons of Silence. Mr Johnson’s girlfriend, Natasha Gromek, was also arrested on drug charges.

Mr Obama, who was given Secret Service protection earlier than any other presidential candidate, has played down fears about his safety. Yet a poll released in Michigan found that 57 per cent of respondents agreed that “there are people who want to hurt Barack Obama because of his race”.

He travels with a retinue of six Secret Service agents at all times. Security in Denver is intense, with nearly 1,500 police officers from across Colorado brought into supplement those from the city, as well as the Secret Service, the US Capitol Police and the National Guard.

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