'They are willing to let me die': Protests rock US as abortion ban takes effect in 'trigger law' states

After the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, hundreds of protesters across the country, marched to denounce the justices' decision to overturn the half-century-old ruling that recognized women's constitutional right to abortion.

The sweeping ruling by the court, with a 6-3 conservative majority, was set to alter American life, with nearly half the states considered certain or likely to ban abortion.

In Texas and Utah, two of 13 states with so-called trigger laws that ban or severely restrict abortions once the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling was struck down, protesters held up banners and vowed to fight for reproductive rights.

Texas trigger-law bans abortions starting from conception and enforces birth even of pregnancies resulting from rape or incest or that show severe fetal abnormalities. The law includes only narrow exceptions for pregnant people at risk of dying or suffering "substantial impairment."

In Utah, health care providers face arrest and criminal fines for providing abortion care. Victims of sexual assault may obtain an abortion, but only if they have filed a police report, which excludes most victims.

"I feel that my country doesn't care about me. I feel like they are willing to--- I know that they are willing to let me die instead of make my own decisions," said Leigh Lucas, a mother in Salt Lake City, Utah, who was protesting the Supreme Court's ruling.

The reverberations of the ruling will be felt far beyond the court's high-security confines - potentially reshaping the battlefield in November's elections to determine whether Biden's fellow Democrats retain control of Congress and signalling a new openness by the justices to change other long-recognized rights.

The decision will also intensify the debate over the legitimacy of the court, once an unassailable cornerstone of the American democratic system but increasingly under scrutiny for its more aggressively conservative decisions on a range of issues.