Trump: 'The War on Our Police Must End Now'

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, delivering another prepared speech on policy, told a rally in West Bend, Wisc., on Tuesday night that "law and order must be restored" in America.

Trump's recent campaign pivot has been to stay on message, having delivered his plans on jobs and foreign policy before his attack on Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton — "she is against the police" — and the Democratic policies that he says have destroyed the economy and endangered communities, leading to unrest such as the recent events in Milwaukee.

"The war on our police must end and must end now," Trump said.

"Hillary Clinton-backed policies are responsible for the problems in the inner cities today and a vote for her is a vote for another generation of poverty, high crime and lost opportunities."

Trump's speech also made a call for the African American vote. He has lagged woefully behind his opponent in that demographic in recent polls.

"It's time for our society to address some honest and very, very difficult truths, the Democratic party has failed and betrayed the African-American community," Trump said.

"Democratic crime policies, education policy and economic policies have produced only more crime, more broken homes and more poverty. Let us look at the situation right here in Milwaukee, a city run by Democrats for decade after decade."

He further stressed that his campaign speaks to the poor and underprivileged more than the "corrupt system" that is "trying to stop" him from winning the election.

"I believe all Americans, not just the powerful, are entitled to security," Trump said.

Trump's speech came during a previously planned visit and was altered to address the recent police shooting of a black man in Milwaukee that has sparked unrest. Officials say initial evidence pointed to the shooting being justified.

"It's law and order. We have to obey the laws or we don't have a country," Trump told Fox News before the speech. "We have a case where good people are out there trying to get people to sort of calm down and they're not calming down and we have our police who are doing a phenomenal job."

Violent protests broke out in Milwaukee on Saturday night after the death earlier in the day of Sylville Smith, 23. Authorities said Smith was stopped for acting suspiciously and then fled, and was shot by police because he was carrying an illegal handgun and refused orders to drop it.

"But the gun was pointed at his (a police officer's) head supposedly ready to be fired. Who can have a problem with that? That's what the narrative is," Trump told Fox News.

"Maybe it's not true. If it is true, people shouldn't be rioting."

About two dozen peaceful protesters greeted Trump on Tuesday evening outside a Milwaukee theater where he taped a town hall session with Fox News.

Earlier on Tuesday, Trump held a roundtable discussion with Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke and Inspector Edward Bailey. But news media representatives were escorted out and not permitted to hear the discussions. Trump took a brief tour of the county's war memorial and posed for pictures with veterans.

Clarke, who is black and spoke last month at the Republican National Convention, has been blunt in his assessment of the unrest, writing in an opinion piece for The Hill that "it was a collapse of the social order where tribal behavior leads to reacting to circumstances instead of waiting for facts to emerge."

Demonstrations on Saturday night turned violent, when cars and businesses were set ablaze and gunfire ripped through the area of protests. The U.S. Midwestern city was calmer on Monday night after a curfew was put in place for teenagers, and community leaders called for peace.

Police violence against African-Americans has set off intermittent, sometimes violent protests in the past two years, igniting a national debate over race and policing in the United States and giving rise to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Reuters contributed to this report.