Trump uses London attack as platform to promote travel ban

Donald Trump has been criticised for tweeting out unconfirmed information about the London Bridge terrorist attack and using the incident to argue in favour of his so-called Muslim travel ban.

The President re-tweeted a headline about the deadly incident at London Bridge and Borough Market from the Drudge Report, a right-wing outlet.

"Fears of new terror attack after van 'mows down 20 people' on London Bridge…" the headline read, which he re-tweeted on his personal Twitter account. NBC responded with its own tweet, warning its audience not to rely on the President's social media.

"Pres[ident] Trump has used Twitter to share news report on London incident. We aren't relaying president's retweet, as the info is unconfirmed."

The President then sent a second message, about 40 minutes later. "We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights.

"We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety!" he said, referring to his controversial executive order that blocked immigrants from six Muslim-majority countries until it was knocked down by federal courts.

On Saturday evening just after 10pm several men in a white van ploughed into pedestrians on London Bridge before exiting the vehicle and stabbing multiple people near a popular pub beside Borough Market. Three suspects were shot dead by the police.

Trump's apparent attempt to score political points relating to his controversial executive order in the wake of the attack prompted outrage from a succession of experts and human rights lawyers.

John Horgan, a terrorism and political violence expert at Georgia State University, called the President an "Opportunist-in-Chief", while Adam Wagner, a human rights barrister, said: "Message from London: political point scoring is the absolute, LAST thing we need right now."

Trump's third twee t on the attack was more in line with previous messages sent to the UK after the Manchester Arena explosion, which killed 22 people, and the Westminster stabbing in March.