Presumptive nominees Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both canceled campaign events Friday, following a sniper attack in Dallas that killed five law enforcement officers and wounded seven more late Thursday night.
Trump canceled a planned trip to Miami, citing the shooting, and Clinton postponed a fundraising event with Vice President Joe Biden in Scranton, Pa.
Clinton will still appear in Philadelphia Friday and was scheduled to speak about police shootings before Thursday’s attack.
A Clinton aide said Thursday before the Dallas shooting that the candidate would address the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, two black men who were shot to death by police earlier this week.
The Dallas attack occurred at a downtown demonstration Thursday evenening in response to the two men’s deaths, and a suspect was killed after trading gunfire with police, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings said Friday morning.
Trump released a statement shortly after canceling his Florida trip, in which he called for “strong leadership, love and compassion” after the Dallas attack.
“We must restore the confidence of our people to be safe and secure in their homes and on the street,” he said. “Crime is harming too many citizens. Racial tensions have gotten worse, not better. This isn’t the American Dream we all want for our children.”
Trump, in his statement, also mentioned the deaths of Sterling and Castile, but mischaracterized them both as “two motorists in Louisiana and Minnesota.” Castile was shot during a traffic stop, but Sterling was selling CDs outside a food mart and not operating a car when he was killed.