(CP) Former President Donald Trump has said that the US Supreme Court was able to overturn Roe v. Wade not just because he appointed three constitutionalist justices to the high court during his presidency, but because "God made the decision."
Fox News asked the former president if he thinks he played a role in the reversal of the landmark 1973 decision because he appointed Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, but Trump responded by saying, "God made the decision."
Asked what he would like to say to his supporters, Trump said, "I think, in the end, this is something that will work out for everybody."
He added, "This brings everything back to the states where it has always belonged."
In a decision released Friday in the case of Thomas Dobbs et al v Jackson Women's Health Organization, the high court ruled 6-3 to uphold Mississippi's Gestational Age Act, which bans most abortions after 15 weeks into a pregnancy.
Justice Samuel Alito authored the majority opinion and was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch. Kavanaugh, Thomas and Chief Justice John Roberts all wrote concurring opinions.
In a statement issued by his political action committee, Trump said, "I did not cave to the Radical Left Democrats, their partners in the Fake News Media, or the RINOs [Republican in Name Only] who are likewise the true, but silent, enemy of the people."
In its 213-page decision, the court said: "Held: The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion; Roe and Casey are overruled; and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives," read the syllabus to the majority opinion.
Also on Friday, former Vice President Mike Pence called for a national ban on abortion.
The decision, Pence said, "has given the American people a new beginning for life, and I commend the justices in the majority for having the courage of their convictions."
"By returning the question of abortion to the states and to the people, this Supreme Court has righted a historic wrong and reaffirmed the right of the American people to govern themselves at the state level in a manner consistent with their values and aspirations," Pence continued.
"Now that Roe v. Wade has been consigned to the ash heap of history, a new arena in the cause of life has emerged, and it is incumbent on all who cherish the sanctity of life to resolve that we will take the defense of the unborn and the support for women in crisis pregnancy centers to every state in America. Having been given this second chance for Life, we must not rest and must not relent until the sanctity of life is restored to the center of American law in every state in the land," he added.
Authoring the majority opinion in the decision, Alito wrote, "We hold that Roe and [Planned Parenthood v. Casey] must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision.
"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division."
Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan filed a dissenting opinion, claiming that Roe and Casey "struck a balance" between allowing abortion and allowing laws to regulate it.
However, Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the national grassroots pro-life activist group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, called the decision a "historic human rights victory for unborn children and their mothers and a bright pro-life future for our nation."
Members of Congress who support abortion were outraged by the ruling.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., made an appearance outside the court Friday afternoon, where she lambasted the Dobbs decision as "illegitimate" and urged people to march "into the streets" to demonstrate their opposition to the ruling. Pictures circulating on social media reveal that businesses in the nation's capital and throughout the country are boarding up in anticipation of violence.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., talked to reporters minutes after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in the Capitol Visitors Center where she lamented that it was "not a good morning" for abortion activists.
Pelosi criticized the court's decision as "the GOP's dark and extreme goal of ripping away women's right to make their own reproductive health decisions."
"Because of Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, the Republican Party and their supermajority on the Supreme Court, American women today have less freedom than their mothers," Pelosi said in a statement.
"With Roe now out of their way, radical Republicans are charging ahead with their crusade to criminalize health freedom. In the Congress, Republicans are plotting a nationwide abortion ban. In the states, Republicans want to arrest doctors for offering reproductive care and women for terminating a pregnancy. GOP extremists are even threatening to criminalize contraception, as well as in-vitro fertilization and post-miscarriage care."
In a statement shared with The Christian Post, the nonprofit law firm Thomas More Society noted that there is more work to be done.
"Today's pro-life victory is still only one more step in our ongoing crusade for the sacred cause we serve. Dobbs will not end abortion. Instead, it will shift our battles to each of the 50 states — both red and blue states," the law firm said.
"Yes, we have cause to celebrate Dobbs as a landmark event. But we must persevere and even intensify our efforts toward ending this scourge of abortion, once and for all, as it still bloodies our nation and corrupts our culture. Let us renew our pro-life efforts with unstinting determination and the utmost vigor!"
