Thousands in U.S. march underneath ‘Ban Off Our Our bodies’ banner for abortion rights

WASHINGTON, May 14 (Reuters) - 1000's 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 choice that legalized abortion nationwide a half century ago.

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

The court's ultimate ruling, which may return the ability to ban abortion to state legislatures, is expected in June. About half of the 50 states are poised to ban or severely limit abortion virtually instantly should Roe be struck down. read more

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

Protesters marching below the slogan "Bans Off Our Bodies" took to the streets from New York and Atlanta to Chicago and Los Angeles in a show of outrage that Democrats hope will help provoke assist for his or her get together and blunt projected Republican positive factors in the November elections. learn more

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

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

Surrounded by police was a bunch of a few dozen counter-demonstrators holding indicators that read: "End abortion violence" and "Ladies's rights begin in the womb."

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

The rally appeared to stay otherwise peaceful, although at the least one counter-protester was seen being escorted away by a security guard in Washington earlier in the day.

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

Abortion rights campaigners take part in an illustration following the leaked Supreme Court docket opinion suggesting the potential for overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion rights choice, in Washington, U.S., May 14, 2022. REUTERS/Amira Karaoud

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Police officers arrived to maintain house between the two teams as they traded taunts and vulgarities. The gang 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, said that the leaked Supreme Court docket draft opinion "treats ladies as objects, as lower than full human beings."

Malcolm DeCesare, a 34-year-old crucial care nurse who attended a Los Angeles rally below sunny skies, stated abolishing the fitting to a authorized abortion could put lives in danger as girls seek unsafe alternatives.

Celebrity girls's rights legal professional Gloria Allred informed the group about her own "back alley abortion" as a younger girl when she grew to become pregnant from a rape at gunpoint before Roe. "I almost died," she recounted. "I used to be left in a tub in a pool of my own blood, hemorrhaging."

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

Casten, whose district consists of Chicago's western suburbs, advised Reuters it was "horrible" that the Supreme Courtroom's conservative majority would contemplate taking away the suitable to an abortion and "condemn women to this lesser status."

At an abortion rights protest in Atlanta, greater than 400 individuals had assembled in a small park in entrance of the state capitol, while about a dozen counter-protesters stood on a close-by sidewalk.

Holding a sign that read, "Stop Child Sacrifice," 23-year-old Bria Marshall, a latest public health graduate from Kennesaw State University, acknowledged her group's smaller turnout.

"Jesus had only a small group, but his message was more powerful," Marshall mentioned.

While the Supreme Court docket leak thrust abortion again to the forefront of U.S. politics, it was unclear how the issue will play out within the coming elections.

Voters shall be weighing a number of priorities similar to inflation and may be skeptical of Democrats' capacity to guard abortion access after legislation that may enshrine abortion rights in federal legislation failed. read more

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

"That is just an affront to all the pieces I believe that we're imagined to be about," Los Angeles musician Joel Altshuler, 73, said. "If a lady has no control over what will occur to her personal physique, then we're again 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 Rich McKay in Atlanta; Writing by Ted Hesson and Steve Gorman; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Cynthia Osterman, Mark Porter and Grant McCool

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Ideas.