Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall continues to remind people that abortion is now illegal under state law except for rare exceptions to protect the life of the mother.
Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ruled to overturn Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision. According to Marshall, that means most abortions are now illegal in the Yellowhammer State.
After the ruling, Marshall released a statement saying, “The issue of abortion now returns to the States—and the State of Alabama has unequivocally elected to be a protector of unborn life.”
Here is my statement on today’s #SCOTUS decision overturning #RoeVWade: pic.twitter.com/HHE1VCp7Jx
— Attorney General Steve Marshall (@AGSteveMarshall) June 24, 2022
Monday, Marshall reiterated his position on WVNN’s “The Dale Jackson Show.”
“The legislature has defined [abortion] as a criminal offense,” he outlined. “We’ve made it a Class A offense, which is the most significant offense we have in our state, and we’re prepared to enforce the law, and I know law enforcement will do the same.”
Marshall said that the “Alabama Human Life Protection Act” passed by the legislature in 2019 was now in effect because the court removed an injunction against the legislation.
“We filed shortly after that decision was rendered on Friday,” he explained, “and by 5:00, we had had an order by Judge Thompson setting aside that injunction, so that law is now in force in effect.”
The attorney general advised it was now his responsibility to give proper “guidance” to those in charge of enforcing the abortion laws.
“We’ve also got to give guidance to local law enforcement and prosecutors about what is the current state of the law,” he said. “So we need to make sure that we’re giving guidance as to how broadly law enforcement is responsible for enforcing this and the theories that prosecutors can use to make sure that the law itself is being prosecuted.”
He also said he didn’t foresee any of the clinics causing problems by openly defying the law and continuing to perform abortions.
“I don’t believe there is,” he said. “In fact, at least anecdotally, what we’ve heard is that the clinics themselves acknowledged what we put out to establish very clearly what the current state of the law is in Alabama and believe they will continue to abide by our directive.”
Marshall emphasized that it was now up to the legislature to make any changes to the abortion restrictions.
“The question’s going to be if the legislature wants to come back in and to develop some more comprehensive approach to this that’s completely their call,” he said, “but right now, we’re going to do the best we can to provide insight into what the current law is in the state of Alabama and be able to share that with those who have now enforcement responsibility moving forward.”
Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” Weekdays 9-11am on WVNN. You can follow him on Twitter @Yaffee
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