Hundreds in U.S. march beneath ‘Ban Off Our Our bodies’ banner for abortion rights

WASHINGTON, May 14 (Reuters) - Hundreds of abortion rights supporters rallied throughout the United States on Saturday, angered by the prospect that the Supreme Court docket could soon overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade resolution that legalized abortion nationwide a half century in the past.

The protests kicked off what organizers predict shall be a "summer season of rage" ignited by the Could 2 disclosure of a draft opinion showing the courtroom's conservative majority ready to reverse the 1973 ruling that established a lady's constitutional proper to terminate her being pregnant.

The court's ultimate ruling, which may return the facility to ban abortion to state legislatures, is expected in June. About half of the 50 states are poised to ban or severely limit abortion almost immediately ought to Roe be struck down. read extra

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"If you can't select whether or not you want to have a child, if that's not a elementary right, then I don't know what's," stated Brita Van Rossum, 62, a panorama designer who traveled from suburban Philadelphia to join the abortion-rights rally within the nation's capital, her first ever.

Protesters marching under the slogan "Bans Off Our Our bodies" took to the streets from New York and Atlanta to Chicago and Los Angeles in a present of shock that Democrats hope will assist galvanize support for his or her get together and blunt projected Republican gains in the November elections. read more

The day's largest demonstration unfolded in Washington, where a crowd that organizers estimated at 20,000 individuals massed at the Washington Monument and braved a light drizzle to march alongside the Nationwide Mall past the U.S. Capitol to the Supreme Court docket itself.

The rally erupted in shouts of "Disgrace" and "Bans off our bodies" as the marchers neared the marbled columns of the courthouse.

Surrounded by police was a bunch of some dozen counter-demonstrators holding signs that read: "Finish abortion violence" and "Women's rights start in the womb."

The encounter between the 2 sides grew tense at instances. Abortion rights protesters shouted, “Go house!,” and one man whacked a counter-demonstrator within the head together with his poster after profanities had been exchanged. As the-anti abortion protesters left, they waved at the crowd, and a few called out, “Bye, Roe v. Wade!”

The rally appeared to remain in any other case peaceable, although at least one counter-protester was seen being escorted away by a security guard in Washington earlier in the day.

The temper was likewise energetic, and sometimes contentious, in New York City as hundreds of abortion rights supporters crossed the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan, the place they had been confronted by a half dozen anti-abortion activists.

Abortion rights campaigners participate in an illustration following the leaked Supreme Court docket opinion suggesting the possibility of overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion rights resolution, in Washington, U.S., May 14, 2022. REUTERS/Amira Karaoud

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Law enforcement officials arrived to take care of house between the 2 groups as they traded taunts and vulgarities. The crowd thinned out in early afternoon as rain fell over the town.

Elizabeth Holtzman, an 80-year-old former congresswoman who represented New York from 1973 to 1981, mentioned that the leaked Supreme Court draft opinion "treats ladies as objects, as less than full human beings."

Malcolm DeCesare, a 34-year-old important care nurse who attended a Los Angeles rally underneath sunny skies, said abolishing the appropriate to a legal abortion may put lives at risk as women search unsafe options.

Movie star women's rights legal professional Gloria Allred informed the crowd about her personal "again alley abortion" as a young woman when she became pregnant from a rape at gunpoint earlier than Roe. "I nearly died," she recounted. "I used to be left in a bathtub in a pool of my very own blood, hemorrhaging."

U.S. Representative Sean Casten and his 15-year-old daughter, Audrey, have been amongst several thousand abortion rights supporters who gathered at a park in Chicago.

Casten, whose district consists of Chicago's western suburbs, instructed Reuters it was "horrible" that the Supreme Court's conservative majority would think about taking away the fitting to an abortion and "condemn girls to this lesser status."

At an abortion rights protest in Atlanta, more than 400 people had assembled in a small park in entrance of the state capitol, while a couple of dozen counter-protesters stood on a nearby sidewalk.

Holding an indication that learn, "Cease Child Sacrifice," 23-year-old Bria Marshall, a recent public well being graduate from Kennesaw State University, acknowledged her group's smaller turnout.

"Jesus had only a small group, but his message was extra powerful," Marshall said.

Whereas the Supreme Courtroom leak thrust abortion again to the forefront of U.S. politics, it was unclear how the issue will play out in the coming elections.

Voters might be weighing a host of priorities reminiscent of inflation and may be skeptical of Democrats' capability to protect abortion entry after legislation that might enshrine abortion rights in federal legislation failed. learn more

Lots of those marching on Saturday expressed worry that rolling back abortion rights would result in an erosion of civil liberties generally.

"That is simply an affront to all the pieces I believe that we're imagined to be about," Los Angeles musician Joel Altshuler, 73, mentioned. "If a woman has no management over what's going to happen to her personal physique, then we're back in 1850 not 1950.

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Reporting by Gabriella Borter in Washington; Extra reporting by Eric Cox in Chicago, Maria Caspani in New York, Costas Pitas in Los Angeles and Wealthy McKay in Atlanta; Writing by Ted Hesson and Steve Gorman; Modifying by Colleen Jenkins, Cynthia Osterman, Mark Porter and Grant McCool

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