Donald Trump's former Vice President is hopping mad over a position his former boss took on abortion, calling it a "slap in the face" to Christian voters who have supported Trump in the past.

The issue is abortion, and Pence was reacting to Trump's statement Monday that he supports the overturning of Roe V. Wade, but that he doesn't support a national abortion ban and thinks abortion restrictions and bans should be left up to the states. 

Trump rightly took credit for the overturning of Roe V. Wade, which would not have happened without his placement of three conservative justices on the court during his term as president.

But Pence wanted to see a national ban on the procedure that Christians believe is taking a human life, and he strongly objected to Trump's decision not to pursue it as a campaign pledge or objective.

States will determine

Trump had said earlier in the day:

The states will determine by vote, or legislation, or perhaps both, and whatever they decide must be the law of the land – in this case, the law of the state," Trump said in a video posted on social media. "Many states will be different. Many states will have a different number of weeks… at the end of the day it is all about the will of the people.

Pence responded in a statement:

President Trump’s retreat on the Right to Life is a slap in the face to the millions of pro-life Americans who voted for him in 2016 and 2020. By nominating and standing by the confirmation of conservative justices, the Trump-Pence Administration helped send Roe v. Wade to the ash heap of history where it belongs and gave the pro-life movement the opportunity to compassionately support women and unborn children.

But the Supreme Court didn't say a national abortion ban would be permissible, only that a national right to abortion wasn't. It's unclear whether the court would rule the same way on a ban.

In addition, abortion has become a polarizing issue for many voters, with a small majority seeming to favor a woman's right to choose at least in the first trimester or before the time of a fetus's viability, currently between 15 and 20 weeks.

Political expediency?

Trump isn't really one to act out of political expediency, but neither is he the kind of staunch pro-life conservative that would die on the hill of an early abortion ban.

It's likely that his personal views dovetail with what he thinks voters want, and he's not afraid to get strict pro-lifers angry by taking the states' rights viewpoint on the issue.

The Supreme Court ruled that there was not an explicit right to abortion in the U.S. Constitution, and the Constitution clearly states that anything not delineated there as a national right is relegated to the states to decide.

Like a great many things, once the door was opened to legal abortions, it has been and will be very difficult to shut again.

Facing the maker

There are a great many things that are declared legal in the U.S. but are not anywhere close to moral, and abortion will be one of them in some states.

We will all get to face our maker one day and answer for our choices, including Trump.