Trump backs up on 'stop and frisk', says he means just Chicago 
 
 Skip Ad Ad Loading... x Embed x Share Donald Trump is considering bringing back the controversial stop-and-frisk tactic. USA TODAY 
 
 Donald Trump attempted to clarify his call to reinstate “stop-and-frisk” police practices Thursday, saying he specifically wanted law enforcement to use the practice in Chicago. 
 
 "I think Chicago needs stop and frisk. Now people can criticize me for that or people can say whatever they want, but they asked me about Chicago and I think stop and frisk with good strong — you know — good, strong law and order. But you have to do something. It can't continue the way it's going," Trump said in an appearance on Fox & Friends Thursday. 
 
 Trump was asked to explain the pros and cons of the controversial police practice. 
 
 "You know, [the police are] proactive and if they see a person possibly with a gun or they think may have a gun, they will see the person and they'll look and they'll take the gun away," Trump said. 
 
 Trump’s call for the practice in Chicago is more specific than Wednesday night where, in a pre-taped an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, he appeared to call for national stop-and-frisk programs. 
 
 The controversial practice allows police to search people based on "specific and articulable facts," but not a specific suspicion of criminal activity. Critics say the practice can lead to racial profiling. 
 
 Trump also discussed the violent protests in Charlotte, N.C. which began after an African American man was shot and killed by a police officer Tuesday. Protests have occurred for two straight nights and one person was in critical condition after being shot Wednesday night. There was also a fatal officer-shooting of an unarmed black man in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Friday. 
 
 "Wow, here we go again. It's very sad. When you look at what's going on it's very sad. It's very divided, our country, and it's getting worse. So, I'm not overly surprised to see it but it's happening everywhere," Trump said. "It just seems that there's a lack of spirit between the white and the black. I mean, it's a terrible thing that we're witnessing." 
 
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 Donald Trump on Thursday said Chicago needs to employ controversial “stop-and-frisk” police practices to stem violence, continuing his critique of policing here a month after saying the city’s crime problem could be stopped in a week if police were “very much tougher.” 
 
 “Chicago is out of control, and I was really referring to Chicago with stop-and-frisk,” the Republican presidential nominee told the television show “Fox & Friends,” responding to criticism for earlier appearing to suggest the tactic should be used nationwide. “They asked me about Chicago, and I was talking about stop-and-frisk for Chicago.” 
 
 The night before, in a town hall in Cleveland Heights, Ohio moderated by Fox News' Sean Hannity, an audience member asked Trump what he would do about “violence in the black community.” He proposed using the practice of officers stopping and questioning people, even searching them if the officers consider them suspicious. 
 
 In Chicago, police have used a similar practice for years, stopping people they deem suspicious and questioning them, sometimes patting them down. Then last year, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois considered suing the Chicago Police Department over the excessive use of the practice, which has been condemned by the ACLU as racial profiling. 
 
 The ACLU said it found Chicago police made more than a quarter-million stops from May through August 2014, a far higher rate than New York City cops did at the height of their stop-and-frisk policy. Its analysis showed Chicago police stopped African-Americans at a disproportionately higher rate than Hispanics and whites, especially in predominantly white neighborhoods. 
 
 The Chicago Police Department said it prohibited racial profiling, but agreed to changes that required officers to more thoroughly document their street stops. The changes were also incorporated in a new state law. 
 
 But officers complained earlier this year that the new, lengthier reports were too time-consuming and confusing, causing street stops to plummet as crime rose. The forms have since been streamlined. 
 
 In New York City, a federal judge found that its use was unconstitutional because of its overwhelming impact on minority residents. 
 
 Trump alluded to none of those problems in Chicago or New York. 
 
 “We did it in New York, it worked incredibly well,” he said in the interview. “You understand, you have to have, in my opinion, I see what’s going on here, I see what’s going on in Chicago, I think stop-and-frisk. In New York City, it was so incredible, the way it worked. Now, we had a very good mayor, but New York City was incredible, the way that worked, so I think that could be one step you could do. 
 
 “I think Chicago needs stop-and-frisk,” Trump continued. “Now, people can criticize me for that or people can say whatever they want. But they asked me about Chicago and I think stop-and-frisk with good strong, you know, good strong law and order. But you have to do something. It can’t continue the way it’s going. 
 
 “If (police) see a person possibly with a gun or they think may have a gun, they will see the person and they'll look and they'll take the gun away,” he said. 
 
 New York Mayor Bill de Blasio oversaw the dismantling of that city’s stop-and-frisk police policy and said Trump’s suggestion of expanding its use would “simply alienate the very people who we need to be partners in the fight against crime.” 
 
 “He does not understand how policing works,” said de Blasio, a Democrat who is supporting Hillary Clinton, Trump’s Democratic rival for president. 
 
 Illinois ACLU spokesman Ed Yohnka also said Trump is wrong about the effectiveness of stop-and-frisk in Chicago. 
 
 “He’s wrong because stop-and-frisk is not the prescription for what is ailing Chicago in terms of violence,” Yohnka said Thursday. “The problem is that there has been a complete breakdown in trust between the police and the community, and one of the elements of that breakdown was a practice of stop-and-frisk, which in the summer of 2014 stopped 250,000 innocent people. 
 
 “And so all that, using sort of that discredited practice, would make that gap between the police and community worse, not better,” he added. “In general, what’s clear is that we need a police strategy in Chicago that connects the police to the neighborhoods with beat cops who know people, who know what’s happening … and the police and the community are working together to solve those problems.” 
 
 Chicago’s rising violence has garnered the city negative attention nationwide, with more people killed so far this year than all of last year. On Wednesday, Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said that the department will expand its hiring capacity by about 1,000 officers to combat the problem. 
 
 Trump has made the city’s crime problem a part of his campaign rhetoric. 
 
 In August, Trump suggested that “top police” in Chicago told him the city’s crime problem could be solved in a week by police “being very much tougher” than they are now. Chicago police officials denied, however, that he met with “top” officials, saying that no one in authority at the department had talked with Trump or his team since at least March. 
 
 Trump also falsely suggested during the town hall that violence in Chicago is worse than in Afghanistan. More than 3,000 people have been shot and more than 500 people have been killed this year in the city. The United Nations' assistance mission in Afghanistan documented a total of 11,002 civilian casualties in 2015 — 3,545 people killed and 7,457 injured, exceeding the previous record set in 2014. 
 
 Trump's comments came as both he and Clinton court minority voters with Election Day less than seven weeks away. 
 
 Associated Press contributed. 
 
 

 Trump clarifies stop-and-frisk: I only meant Chicago 
 
 Donald Trump doubled down on his call for implementation of stop-and-frisk Thursday — but only in Chicago. 
 
 The Republican presidential nominee suggested the controversial stop-and-frisk policy to mitigate violent crime in America’s inner cities during an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity broadcast Wednesday evening. 
 
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 On Thursday, he clarified that he was only referring to enacting it in Chicago, where he said more than 3,000 shootings have taken place this year. 
 
 “I was really referring to Chicago with stop-and-frisk,” he told “Fox and Friends” during a phone interview Thursday morning. “They asked me about Chicago and I was talking about stop-and-frisk for Chicago.” 
 
 But while Trump scaled down where stop-and-frisk should be deployed, the self-proclaimed law-and-order candidate hardly softened his stance on the policing practice that studies have shown is biased. He cited New York, where a federal court ruled the practice unconstitutional in 2013 because it disproportionately impacts people of color (though an appeals court overturned the ruling, and the city eventually settled), as evidence that it works. 
 
 “I mean, the numbers were unbelievably changed,” he said of crime statistics before and after New York implemented stop-and-frisk. “I don’t mean just a little bit. It was massively changed, and it became a safe city. It went from an unsafe city to a safe city.” 
 
 Trump highlighted Chicago as a city that’s “out of control” right now but where stop-and-frisk is a necessity that can save the city from itself, suggesting it’s more dangerous to be there than in war-torn nations like Afghanistan. 
 
 “I think Chicago needs stop-and-frisk,” Trump said. “Now, people can criticize me for that or people can say whatever they want, but they asked me about Chicago, and I think stop-and-frisk, with good, strong, you know, good, strong law and order. But you have to do something. It can’t continue the way it’s going.” 
 
 David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama, blasted Trump’s “problematic” rhetoric — even if he was only referring to Chicago. 
 
 “That’s like taking a can of kerosene and pouring it over a fire,” he said of Trump’s call for stop-and-frisk during an interview with CNN. “It wasn’t what was needed.” 
 
 Trump shared his denotation of the term, first explaining that “there are different levels” to stop-and-frisk. “Basically, they will, if they see poss… — you know, they’re proactive, and if they see a person possibly with a gun or they think may have a gun, they will see the person, and they’ll look and they’ll take the gun away,” Trump said. “They’ll stop, they’ll frisk, and they’ll take the gun away, and they won’t have anything to shoot with. I mean, how it’s not being used in Chicago is, to be honest with you, it’s quite unbelievable. And, you know, the police, the local police, they know who has a gun, who shouldn’t be having a gun. They understand that.” 
 
 Trump’s definition, however, excluded any racial bias — at a time when the nation is already reeling from a series of fatal shootings of black men at the hands of police officers just days apart, marked by unrest in Charlotte, North Carolina, where Gov. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency Wednesday evening. 
 
 Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Trump surrogate, hailed the practice as a strategy that reduced crime and is the solution to reducing gun violence. 
 
 “Because it takes the gun right out of your hand,” said Giuliani, who added that no one is taking guns away in New York or Chicago “because bad guys don’t go register” guns. 
 
 “You know, ‘Fat Tony’ Salerno doesn’t go get a gun permit. Neither does the hood on the street go get a permit,” he continued. “You know why? There’s probably a warrant for his arrest and he’s gonna go to jail. So he doesn’t get a permit.” 
 
 Trump contended that “you can’t let the system go the way it’s going,” adding that “some people” think stop-and-frisk is “a great idea, and some people probably don’t like it” — New York Mayor Bill de Blasio is of the latter group. 
 
 De Blasio condemned stop-and-frisk, insisting that it “created a real wedge between police and community and created division.” De Blasio credited “a systematic strategic approach to policing,” not stop-and-frisk, for reduced crime in New York. 
 
 “You know, Donald Trump talks about stop-and-frisk like he knows the facts. He has had no experience with policing, no experience with public safety,” de Blasio told CNN. “He should really be careful because if we reinstituted stop-and-frisk all over this country, you would see a lot more tension between police and community.” 
 
 White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest declined to respond to Trump's comments. 
 
 "I think it does raise questions that a politician would be so dogmatic about protecting second amendment rights yet rather cavalier about protecting the constitutional prohibition against an illegal search and seizure," he said. "It might lead one person to conclude that the politician is more interested in playing politics than finding a solution." 
 
 But Earnest made sure to note that stop-and-frisk is not the type of practice the administration and its allies support. 
 
 "Expanding and doubling down on stop and frisk policies is not among the suggestions, I think for rather obvious reasons." 
 
 Brent Griffiths contributed to this story.
– After appearing to endorse its use nationally on Wednesday, Donald Trump clarified Thursday that he meant stop-and-frisk—a policing policy found to be inherently biased and unconstitutional in the past—should only be used in Chicago, Politico reports. "I was really referring to Chicago with stop-and-frisk," he said. "How it’s not being used in Chicago is, to be honest with you, it’s quite unbelievable." Trump said Chicago needs stop-and-frisk because it's "out of control" and being there is currently more dangerous than being in Afghanistan. According to USA Today, stop-and-frisk allows police to search people even when they aren't suspected of a crime. When asked for more details on his stop-and-frisk proposal, Trump explained: "If they see a person possibly with a gun or they think may have a gun, they will see the person and they'll look and they'll take the gun away." The practice was declared unconstitutional by a federal court in New York and studies have shown it to be biased. Chicago police were actually doing something similar to stop-and-frisk until they were threatened with a lawsuit by the ACLU last year, the Chicago Tribune reports. The ACLU found that Chicago cops were stopping a disproportionate number of black people, especially when they were in "white" neighborhoods.