President Barack Obama on Tuesday
predicted that the Supreme Court will strike down state marriage bans
later this year.
In comments to BuzzFeed
News, the president also weighed in on the legal wrangling taking
place in Alabama after its chief justice ordered state judges to defy
a federal judge's rulings declaring the state's ban on gay marriage
unconstitutional.
“My sense is that the Supreme Court
is about to make a shift, one that I welcome, which is to recognize
that – having hit a critical mass of states that have recognized
same-sex marriage – it doesn't make sense for us to now have this
patchwork system,” Obama said.
“It's time to recognize that under
the equal protection clause of the United States [Constitution],
same-sex couples should have the same rights as anybody else.”
On the attempt to block marriage
equality in Alabama, Obama stated that the law was clear.
“[W]e have a supremacy clause in our
Constitution,” he said. “When federal law is in conflict with
state law, federal law wins out.”
(Related: Obama
supported gay marriage before 2008, David Axelrod claims.)