Maryland Governor Says Obama Urged Him to Exercise 'Due Restraint'

(CNSNews.com) - Both the mayor of Baltimore and governor of Maryland said they spoke to President Obama on Monday, but the president had nothing to say publicly about the out-of-control looting, burning and police-pelting in Baltimore, a city just 40 miles north of the U.S. capital. He's letting his new attorney general handle it.

"I had a long discussion with the president about this, this evening," Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) told reporters at a Monday night news conference. Hogan announced that he had just activated the National Guard, at the Baltimore mayor's request -- a request that came many hours after the looting and fires began.

"He thanked me for the action," Hogan said of the president. "Said he thought we we're doing the right thing. He said I assume that you and your team will be exercising due restraint, I assured them that we were.

"The last thing we want to do is escalate the violence, but I also assure them that weren't going to standby and allow our City of Baltimore to be taken over by thugs," Hogan said.

"And he said that the Justice Department was going to be -- the new attorney general will be coming into the Baltimore -- that we're going to sit down and work together to try to see if we can bring calm to the community and find answers in the case of Freddie Gray. But that was a separate situation, that he felt we absolutely knew to get control of our streets and he endorsed the action that we're taken tonight."

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