WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani asked for "privacy" Monday in dealing with what the Republican presidential hopeful called "difficulties" between him and his 21 year-old son.

"I believe that these problems with blended families, you know, are challenges, sometimes they are, and the challenges are best worked on privately," Giuliani told reporters in a joint news conference with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger concerning gang violence. "In other words, the more privacy I can have for my family, the better we're going to be able to deal with all these difficulties."

Giuliani's comments came after his son Andrew, a Duke University sophomore, told the New York Times in an interview published Saturday that he was trying to make amends with his famous father after not speaking to him for a "decent amount of time."

"There's obviously a little problem that exists between me and his wife," Andrew Giuliani told the New York Times. "And we're trying to figure that out. But as of right now it's not working as well as we would like."

A fixture in Giuliani's past political campaigns, Andrew Giuliani told the New York Times he would not become involved in his father's presidential bid.

"I am going to be focused on my golf for the next, well really I don't even know for the next how long, but definitely over the next bunch of years," he said. "So I'm not going to have time to, even if I wanted to, be in the campaign."

Giuliani and Andrew's mother, Donna Hanover, filed for Divorce in 2000 after 16 years of marriage. He married his current wife, Judith Nathan in 2003.

In the press conference Monday, Giuliani called his wife Judith a "loving mother and step-mother," and said, "She's done everything she can, the responsibility is mine."

Watch Giuliani comment on family "difficulties"

-- CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney

Posted 3/05/2007 03:12:00 PM | Permalink