Photo: Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images
Thousands of people gathered in Washington DC and at hundreds of events across the country on Saturday to demonstrate in defense of the right to abortion.
Under the motto “Bans off our bodies”, more than 430 demonstrations, rallies and activities throughout the country.
The demonstrations are a direct response to the leaked draft of a Supreme Court opinion indicating that it is poised to unseat Roe. v. Wade, the 49 year-old decision that guaranteed a person’s constitutional right to an abortion .
The Senate failed to pass legislation on Wednesday a bill that would codify the constitutional right to abortion into federal law, after the 50 Republicans and Sen. Joe Manchin III (DW.Va.) opposed moving forward with the bill, called Law for the Protection of Women’s Health.
The liberal groups that organized Saturday’s protests designed the events as a strong message to the country’s leaders that most Americans support the Roe vs. Wade defense . In Washington, women and men of all ages gathered on the National Mall.
“Women’s rights are under attack”, Vice President Kamala Harris expressed this Saturday on Twitter.
In other cities of the country
Several hundred people gathered Saturday morning to protest the restrictions imposed and defend the right to abortion in downtown San Antonio, Texas. Many in the crowd said they had attended abortion rights rallies in recent months to protest a restrictive Texas law, which went into effect in September and prohibits most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.
In Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Hundreds of abortion rights advocates lined up several blocks in front of the federal courthouse, drawing continual honks of support from motorists.
Other demonstrations were held in New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles.
One of the largest was recorded in New York, where thousands of people, mostly women, crossed the iconic Brooklyn Bridge to flow into Foley Square.
In the City Hall Square of Los Angeles, in California, about 5, people gathered to shout almost in unison “My body, my decision”.
“We went out to the street because women will be in danger if we are prohibited from having legal abortions, and we will not remain silent”, said the founder of the Women’s March Foundation, Emiliana Guereca.
Planned Parenthood estimates that 26 states governed by Republicans, such as Texas, Arizona, Missouri and Georgia, would restrict the right to abortion or suppress it.
The right to abortion is already the subject of the campaign of many candidates for the elections of 2022, in which the Democrats fear losing their majority in both houses of Congress.
Most Americans, a 54 %, considers that the Supreme of should maintain the protection of abortion, according to a survey by The Washington Post and the ABC network.
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