United States: Tens of thousands of demonstrators defend the right to abortion

"Hands off our bodies!" “: Tens of thousands of people demonstrated on Saturday to defend the right to abortion, threatened by the Supreme Court which seems ready to go back 50 years after its historic decision to protect abortion.

United States: Tens of thousands of demonstrators defend the right to abortion

"Hands off our bodies!" “: Tens of thousands of people demonstrated on Saturday to defend the right to abortion, threatened by the Supreme Court which seems ready to go back 50 years after its historic decision to protect abortion.

Some 450 processions were organized across the country, including large marches in Washington, New York, Chicago, Austin and Los Angeles. A demonstration across the whole country which did not however largely mobilize the 329 million inhabitants.

VIDEO. In the United States, demonstrations across the country to save abortion

"Nobody has the right to make a decision about someone else's body," Hanna Williamson, a 20-year-old protester in Washington, told. "I fight for everyone's rights." In the crowd, protesters held pink signs that read "Hands Off Our Bodies", others shouted "The Supreme Court wants to kill women", "Make the Court abort", and a large banner "Our bodies, our abortions was placed in front of the procession.

In the capital, the parade of several thousand people must end in front of the Supreme Court building. In New York, the procession of some 3,000 people was led by Democratic senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, as well as city attorney Letitia James. Mayor Eric Adams was also in the crowd.

Twenty states promise to make it illegal

They were 5,000 in Houston, Texas, according to organizers, and a thousand in Louisville, Kentucky, a conservative southern state where only two Planned Parenthood clinics perform abortions. Several thousand people also demonstrated in Los Angeles.

Even if it is supported by a majority of the population, according to recent polls, the right to abortion has been a very divisive social issue since the historic decision "Roe v. Wade” of January 1973, which protects the right of American women to terminate their pregnancies.

Read alsoRight to abortion: five minutes to understand its questioning in the United States

The Supreme Court, now firmly entrenched in conservatism, has been in turmoil since early May and news site Politico revealed a proposed ruling that, if passed as is, will grant US states the right to prohibit or authorize abortions.

She must make her decision by the end of June on a Mississippi law limiting the legal time limits for abortion. These deadlines are already restricted in 23 states and about 20 conservative states have already promised to make it illegal, some even in cases of rape or incest. This would force women to travel thousands of miles to get abortions.

The elected Democrats in Congress have promised to protect the right to abortion in the states where they have a majority. The House of Representatives passed a law last fall guaranteeing access to abortion throughout the country, but this text is blocked in the Senate, where the Democrats do not have a sufficient majority.


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