Carrying colorful signs and banners that read “Doctors not doctrine” and “Abortion is health care,” hundreds of activists chanted, marched and rallied outside the Supreme Court for hours starting Tuesday morning before the justices weighed the availability of a commonly used abortion pill.
Abortion rights supporters outnumbered abortion opponents, but the two factions occasionally clashed over common demands, including over the safety of the pill mifepristone. (Studies show that this is actually a safe abortion.)
Some traveled across the country to demonstrate. Courtney Brown, a coffee shop owner who helped found an abortion rights group in Amarillo, Texas, where the case originated, described her city as “ground zero” in the fight over abortion.
She added: “I’m just ready to fight back because we’re so sick of these rights being taken away from us.”
A handful of small spherical robots carrying abortion pills circled the courtroom, remotely controlled and called “Roe-Bots.” Potential recipients would use the “Roe-Bot” to complete a telehealth consultation with a provider in a state where the pill is legal, and the machine would then dispense a pill.
Three New York medical students who accompanied the “Roe-Bots” emphasized the importance of the case as future doctors and gynecologists at risk of facing restrictions in reproductive care.
Supreme Court justices “didn’t go to medical school,” said Sarah McNeilly, a student at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. “You should trust and rely on the FDA, a world-class institution full of brilliant people who are deeply committed to their work, and you should let them do their job and stop trying to politicize science.”
About 13 abortion rights activists were arrested for violating a law against gatherings, obstruction or harassment on U.S. Capitol grounds, according to Capitol Police. The arrests were part of a civil disobedience plan intended to highlight the far-reaching consequences of the case, which could severely restrict access to the pill and undermine the FDA’s regulatory power. The arrest should “do justice to the seriousness of the threat.” ” on reproductive rights, said Rachel O’Leary Carmona, executive director of the Women’s March, who was among the 13 arrested.
The arrests also send a message to the Supreme Court: “No matter the outcome, we will ensure that people have access to abortion drugs when they need them,” she added.
As the clashes continued, activists staged dueling rallies on both sides of the courthouse steps. Anti-abortion activists framed abortion rights as a women’s health issue.
One of those activists, Melanie Salazar, 31 weeks pregnant, had a message scrawled on her bare stomach: “Totally human.” Feeling her baby move further crystallized and nurtured her opinion about abortion, she said Hope for “another victory against the abortion industrial complex.”
“My baby is a whole person, just like I am a whole person and like every child is a whole person,” she said.
Celeste McCall, 79, who supports abortion rights, interjected: “I’m a whole person too.”
Ms. McCall added that she felt the need to speak alongside Ms. Salazar because “she appears to have received bad information that said the pills were harmful.”
“I thought we had this all sorted out 50 years ago when I was young,” she said, gesturing toward the courthouse before running to join a chant. “Didn’t they do enough damage?”
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2024-03-27 00:54:29
www.nytimes.com