The rap community has backed Eminem and called for his protection after he unleashed a lyrical tirade against Donald Trump and told his fans who support the President to pick a side.

The rapper unveiled The Storm, a four-minute freestyle rap video recorded in a Detroit carpark, as part of BET's Hip Hop Awards.

Eminem slammed the Republican President as "a kamikaze who will probably cause a nuclear holocaust" before criticising Mr Trump's ongoing campaign against NFL national anthem protests.

"This is his form of distraction, plus he gets an enormous reaction when he attacks the NFL, so we focus on that instead of talking Puerto Rico or gun reform for Nevada," he rapped.

"All these horrible tragedies and he's bored and would rather cause a Twitter storm with the Packers [NFL team]."

He mentioned NFL free agent quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who is credited with launching the ongoing anthem protests.

Kaepernick told the rapper on Twitter, "I appreciate you".

Hip hop artists Snoop Dogg, Sean Diddy Combs and T-Pain also tweeted their support.

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Snoop posted a video message to Eminem on Instagram.

"Shout out to Eminem for saying some real shit," he said.

Basketballer LeBron James, who took aim at Mr Trump and called him a "bum" as the NFL anthem protests gathered steam, had this to say:

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Eminem also took down Mr Trump's recently unveiled plan for tax cuts, questioning, "Then who's going to pay for his extravagant trips back and forth with his fam to his golf resorts and his mansions?"

At one point he called the President, who is 71, a "racist 94-year-old grandpa" and compared his appearance to the Marvel Comics character The Thing.

The 44-year-old rapper finished his rant with a message to his fans who support Trump, saying, "I'm drawing in the sand a line, you're either for or against".

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the video, and Mr Trump did not mention it while tweeting on several issues the morning after the awards.

This is Eminem's most recent attack on Mr Trump.

It follows up last year's nine-minute freestyle track Campaign Speech and a verse earlier this year on Big Sean's No Favours.

AP/ABC