Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on Friday defending the federal government’s refusal to allow abortions for immigrants.

“The Constitution does not confer the right to an elective abortion on unlawfully-present aliens with virtually no ties to the country,” Paxton said in a brief representing an 11-state coalition. “Under long-settled doctrine, the constitutional rights an alien may invoke depend on the scope of the alien’s ties to this country.”