Duke rebuked for likening Roe v Wade to ‘horrific war in Ukraine’

‘What wounded me was the Duke of Sussex [comparing] the decision with the Russian attack on Ukraine’

THE Duke of Sussex has been mocked by a Supreme Court judge after apparently comparing the overturning of Roe v Wade with the war in Ukraine.

The Duke last week used his speech at the UN to criticise the “rolling back of constitutional rights here in the United States” as part of a “global assault on democracy and freedom”.

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, a conservative judge who wrote the ruling that overturned long-standing abortion rights in America, has now singled him out alongside world leaders Boris Johnson and Justin Trudeau for voicing their opinions.

Speaking at a conference on religious liberty in Rome, he said: “What really wounded me, what really wounded me, was, when the Duke of Sussex addressed the United Nations and seemed to compare the decision, whose name may not be spoken, with the Russian attack on Ukraine.”

He added: “I had the honour this term of writing [what] I think [is] the only Supreme Court decision in the history of that institution that has been lambasted by a whole string of foreign leaders who felt perfectly fine commenting on American law.”

The event was hosted by the University of Notre Dame Law School.

The Duke’s comments came as part of his speech to the United Nations on Nelson Mandela Day which the Duchess watched from the audience.

Summing up the state of the world as he saw it, he referred to: “Climate change wreaking havoc on our planet, with the most vulnerable suffering most of all.

“The few, weaponising lies and disinformation at the expense of the many.

“And from the horrific war in Ukraine to the rolling back of constitutional rights here in the United States, we are witnessing a global assault on democracy and freedom – the cause of Mandela’s life.”

The Duchess had already given an insight into the Duke’s views on the Roe v Wade decision, using her own interview with Gloria Steinem on the topic to say the reaction in her house had been “guttural”, with her “feminist” husband equally despairing,

She said: “It tells us that our physical safety doesn’t matter, and as a result that we don’t matter. But we do. Women matter.”

Justice Alito, renowned as one of the Supreme Court’s most conservative justices, was nominated to the court by President George W Bush in 2005, and declared in his speech “religious liberty is worth defending”.

In 2013, the 72-year-old was considered “one of the most conservative justices on the Court”.

He has described himself as a “practical originalist” on the ground that he believes “the Constitution means something and that that meaning doesn’t change”.