House Majority Whip Steve Scalise said Friday at a gathering of social conservatives in Washington that a Hillary Clinton-appointed Supreme Court justice might have blocked Congress from holding opening prayers.
The Louisiana Republican, who credits prayer with helping him recover from being shot in June, discussed a federal court ruling this week that the House of Representatives can open with a prayer, in a ruling against a speaker denied the right to hold a secular invocation.
“Talking about God, this got no attention, believe it or not,” Scalise said, describing the Wednesday court ruling to a Values Voter Summit audience in a hotel ballroom.
“Just imagine if that case went to the Supreme Court and Hillary Clinton was president,” he said, postulating that a Clinton-nominated justice might have voted to overturn the district court ruling.
In 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court found in a 5-4 decision that government legislative bodies can open with a prayer, even if those prayers are overwhelmingly Christian.
“Now because of President Trump we have Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court,” Scalise said. “We’ve got a court that will actually interpret the Constitution the way it was written.”
The majority of Scalise’s remarks dealt with his recovery from being shot at a congressional baseball practice. He said that prayer gave him “a calmness because I knew it was in God’s hands.”
