Around 100 protesters gathered outside City Hall in Hartford on Monday to rally against the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Signs in hand, activists chanted in solidarity as they gathered to protest the ruling that effectively ended the Constitutional right to have an abortion. One sign read, “Bans Off Our Bodies” and another read “Ruth Sent Us” in reference to former Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died in 2020.
The rally was organized by the Nonprofit Accountability Group, which includes a host of non-profits throughout the state, including Workers’ Voice, BLM860, PowerUp CT, Kamora’s Cultural Corner, 350 CT, Sunrise Connecticut, Sierra Club Connecticut Chapter, Quiet Corner Shouts and Resource Generation Connecticut.
The Supreme Court turned the abortion issue over to the states in its opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson overturning the landmark 1973 case on Friday. Since then, hundreds of protests have been held in the country, including in Connecticut.
“Abortion is health care,” shouted Tenaya Taylor, executive director and founder of the Nonprofit Accountability Group, to the crowd that echoed it back. “Health care is a fundamental right. We’re here because we’re not going to be silent.”
Other activists from the group also spoke and touched on many different issues surrounding race, police brutality and economic inequality.
“If we took care of the trans lives, the queer lives, the elderly lives, the homeless lives and those with mental health issues and the disabled we wouldn’t be here today,” said Keren Prescott, founder and CEO of PowerUp CT. “But when you don’t take care of the least, you will not take care of the most.”
Prescott shared her own personal story of having an abortion after she was raped in 1999.
“Thank God I was able to have an abortion back then,” Prescott said. “I came back to Hartford where that was seen as health care. That right has now been taken.”
Prescott said that since the abortion ruling just a few days ago many people have come up to her asking how to fight back. She noted that many of them are new to protesting and organizing but feel empowered to take action.
“What I want to say to our Black, brown and non-white folks is that this is a new fight for white people because for many years their skin color, class, status and privilege has afforded them a protection they never understood,” said Prescott. “Being white meant having every single protection until now. We welcome them into our fight. We are in this for the long haul.”
Others in attendance spoke on the intersectionality between abortion and other issues, including the environment.
“It’s not hard to see the intersectionality between reproductive rights and the climate movement: For one thing, people in the climate movement get pregnant. They must be able to choose whether they want to have children or not,” said Melinda Tuhus, an activist with the environmental non-profit 350 CT. “Mothers are the most impacted demographic in climate catastrophes — they have to protect and figure out how to feed and house their children when they lose their homes — and mothers — especially single mothers — often have the fewest resources.”
Tuhus sporting a climate justice “Walk for Our Grandchildren” shirt, spoke about her memories before Roe in the early 1970s to many of the younger protesters.
“I was almost 25 when Roe was decided, so there were plenty of years when my friends and classmates were getting illegal, sometimes dangerous and deadly abortions,” Tuhus said. “We won’t go back!”
Protesters came from all over the state with some even driving more than an hour to show their support.
“It was important that I came to this,” said Claudia Allen, of Thompson. “I’m here to stand for all women so they can make their own decision about their own bodies. Many black and brown women and those who are underprivileged will die because of this. We need to make our voices heard.”
Of the 26 states that have signaled a ban on abortion, 13 have laws in place that are designed to be “triggered” and take effect automatically or by quick state action after the Roe ruling — Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wyoming.
In May, Gov. Ned Lamont signed Public Act 22-19, a first-in-the-nation law that protects medical providers and patients seeking abortion care in Connecticut who may be traveling from other states that have outlawed abortion. Additionally, the law expands abortion access in Connecticut by expanding the type of practitioners eligible to perform certain abortion-related care.
“Reproductive rights will be protected here in Connecticut,” Lamont said. “Roe may not be the law of the land but it will be the law in the state as long as I’m here.”
Stephen Underwood can be reached at sunderwood@courant.com
