Charlie LeDuff on Trump sending federal agents to Detroit: People are 'scared... angry and they want help'

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Charlie LeDuff on 'historical' increase in crime in Detroit

Should federal officers be sent to Detroit next? Author Charlie LeDuff weighs in.

Pulitzer Prize-winning Michigan journalist Charlie LeDuff told "The Story" Thursday that Detroit is "in for a slog" as gun violence continues to surge at troubling rates in the city.

"I think we are in for a slog here," LeDuff told host Martha McCallum. "I think you know it and the country knows it, the police do their jobs, [but] there's not enough police to do it and some are afraid to do it but just last week they pulled 106 guns off of 117 arrestees. Guns are everywhere."

OPERATION LEGEND: IS IT CONSTITUTIONAL? 

LeDuff's comments come a day after President Trump vowed to deploy federal troops to several U.S. cities -- including Detroit --  to combat rising crime.

The "surge" of agents to struggling American cities is part of Operation Legend -- named after 4-year-old LeGend Taliferro, who was fatally shot while sleeping in a Kansas City apartment late last month -- and comes as federal law enforcement officers have already descended on Portland, Ore., and Kansas City, Mo.

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LeDuff said the federal presence in Detroit comes as a relief to residents who are "scared... angry, and they want help.

"Nobody seriously thinks you should defund the police because as we talked about before, we've already done it and look what's happening," he said.

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LeDuff urged Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to take matters into her own hands and enlist state troopers to the major boulevards and allow police to patrol residential neighborhoods instead.

"We've got more state troopers than the president is sending federal agents," he said.

"She's not even talking about it, " LeDuff added, arguing that Whitmer is too "busy tweeting with the president."

Fox News’ Andrew O’Reilly contributed to this report.