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

WASHINGTON, Might 14 (Reuters) - 1000's of abortion rights supporters rallied throughout the USA on Saturday, angered by the prospect that the Supreme Courtroom may quickly overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide a half century ago.

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

The court's final ruling, which may return the power to ban abortion to state legislatures, is anticipated in June. About half of the 50 states are poised to ban or severely restrict abortion almost immediately should Roe be struck down. learn more

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"If you can't choose whether you need to have a child, if that is not a elementary right, then I do not know what's," said Brita Van Rossum, 62, a panorama designer who traveled from suburban Philadelphia to hitch the abortion-rights rally within the nation's capital, her first ever.

Protesters marching underneath the slogan "Bans Off Our Bodies" took to the streets from New York and Atlanta to Chicago and Los Angeles in a show of shock that Democrats hope will help provoke help for their occasion and blunt projected Republican good points within the November elections. learn more

The day's largest demonstration unfolded in Washington, where a crowd that organizers estimated at 20,000 people massed at the Washington Monument and braved a light-weight drizzle to march along the Nationwide Mall previous the U.S. Capitol to the Supreme Courtroom itself.

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

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

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

The rally appeared to stay in any other case peaceful, though no less than one counter-protester was seen being escorted away by a safety guard in Washington earlier within the day.

The mood was likewise energetic, and sometimes contentious, in New York Metropolis as 1000's of abortion rights supporters crossed the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan, where 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 potential of overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion rights determination, in Washington, U.S., May 14, 2022. REUTERS/Amira Karaoud

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Cops arrived to take care of area between the two teams 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, stated that the leaked Supreme Courtroom draft opinion "treats ladies as objects, as less than full human beings."

Malcolm DeCesare, a 34-year-old vital care nurse who attended a Los Angeles rally beneath sunny skies, stated abolishing the best to a authorized abortion could put lives at risk as girls search unsafe options.

Celeb women's rights lawyer Gloria Allred told the gang about her own "back alley abortion" as a younger woman when she grew to become pregnant from a rape at gunpoint earlier than Roe. "I almost died," she recounted. "I was left in a bathtub in a pool of my very own blood, hemorrhaging."

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

Casten, whose district contains Chicago's western suburbs, instructed Reuters it was "horrible" that the Supreme Courtroom's conservative majority would think about taking away the proper 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 close-by sidewalk.

Holding a sign that read, "Cease Child Sacrifice," 23-year-old Bria Marshall, a current 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 highly effective," Marshall mentioned.

While the Supreme Courtroom leak thrust abortion back to the forefront of U.S. politics, it was unclear how the difficulty will play out within the coming elections.

Voters can be weighing a number of priorities equivalent to inflation and could also be skeptical of Democrats' capability to guard abortion entry after laws that might enshrine abortion rights in federal legislation failed. learn more

Lots of these marching on Saturday expressed worry that rolling back abortion rights would lead to an erosion of civil liberties usually.

"That is just an affront to every little thing I imagine that we're purported 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 back in 1850 not 1950.

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Reporting by Gabriella Borter in Washington; Additional 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; Modifying by Colleen Jenkins, Cynthia Osterman, Mark Porter and Grant McCool

Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.