Fox News host Mike Huckabee on Saturday said he never claimed that the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut was linked to the lack of religion in schools.

When asked about the massacre of children, the former Arkansas governor on Friday lamented “we’ve systematically removed God from our schools.” Huckabee suggested Americans shouldn’t be surprised that “schools have become such a place of carnage” without God.

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On Saturday, Huckabee complained that the “predictable left lit up the airwaves and blogosphere with a vile and vicious reaction, and jumped to the conclusion that I said if we had prayer in school the shooting wouldn’t have happened.” He insisted he had “said nothing of the sort” before appearing to double-down on linking violence to a lack of religion.

The Fox News host listed the examples of how God had been “escorted” out of American culture. Huckabee noted the legal battles over government-sponsored displays of the Christian faith. He claimed that churches and Christian businesses were forced to provide “tax-funded abortion pills.” In an apparent swipe at LGBT individuals, he said society had stopped calling some things “sinful,” instead calling them “disorders” or even normal.

“And somebody is going to suggest we pass a law to stop all this kind of thing,” Huckabee concluded. “I might want to point out that we don’t have to pass a new law, there is one that has been around awhile that works if we’d teach it and observe it: ‘Thou shall not kill.'”

Watch video, courtesy of Fox News, below: