FARGO — Dozens of people participated in a noon protest in downtown Fargo and in front of City Hall on Sunday, May 8, in support of maintaining the legality of abortion access.

Protesters chanted “Not your body, not your choice!” at the busy corner of Broadway and First Avenue North in downtown Fargo, holding up signs supporting abortion rights and women’s reproductive rights.

Participants in “Defending the Rules of Engagement: Women’s Rights Are Human Rights” also lined up outside the Civic Memorial Auditorium and City Hall, a few blocks east.

A Facebook invite to the protest reads:

“The body is inviolable, subject to its will alone. The Supreme Court is expected to rule on Roe V Wade in June, which is why it is very important to make our voices heard first!” the invitation read, “Come and ask the Supreme Court that we have safe and legal abortion accessible.”

The local protest and others that have erupted across the country follow the unauthorized release of a Supreme Court draft opinion that would end national abortion protections and return the decision to individual states on the legality of abortion procedures.

The 1973 Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortion for decades in the United States. It was reinforced by a 1992 opinion, Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

But the leaked draft opinion, written by associate conservative judge Samuel Alito, strongly repudiates that right.

“Roe was horribly wrong all along,” Alito wrote.

“We feel that Roe and Casey should be canceled,” Alito said in the draft notice. “It is time to respect the Constitution and to return the question of abortion to the elected representatives of the people.

Thirteen states, including North Dakota and South Dakota, have trigger laws in place that would automatically ban abortion in the first and second trimesters of a pregnancy if Roe v. Wade is canceled.

In total, about half of the states are expected to enact significant restrictions or bans on abortion, most in the Midwest and South.