Pro-abortion protesters march to justices' homes

Protests over a leaked Supreme Court document that would overturn the ruling that made abortion a federal right have intensified in the US, with demonstrators showing up outside justices' homes, and fencing installed around the court building in Washington.

Abortion rights protesters marched to the homes of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh in Maryland on Saturday night.

"The time for civility is over, man," protests organizer Lacie Wooten-Holway, 39, told Bloomberg. "Being polite doesn't get you anywhere."

Kavanaugh is among the five justices who had cast preliminary votes to overturn Roe v. Wade, the news website Politico reported on May 2. The landmark 1973 ruling legalized abortion across the United States. If the ruling were overturned, abortion laws would be determined by the individual states.

The majority opinion was written by Justice Samuel Alito, and it was unclear how Roberts－who ordered an investigation into the unprecedented leak－planned to vote. Roberts also said that the draft does not mean the opinion is final.

The court's ideological makeup is six conservatives and three liberals, although Roberts sometimes has split with the conservative majority.

A group called ShutDownDC was planning to hold a protest outside Alito's house on Monday.

A White House official told Fox News Digital in a statement on Sunday that US President Joe Biden, who is Catholic, opposes any "attempts to intimidate" justices.

"The President has made clear throughout his time in public life that Americans have the fundamental right to protest under the Constitution, whatever their point of view," said the statement.

On Friday at a conference in Atlanta, Justice Clarence Thomas, one of the most conservative jurists, said of the court: "We can't be an institution that can be bullied into giving you just the outcomes you want."

A security fence was erected around the perimeter of the Supreme Court building late on Wednesday.

The US Senate will vote on Wednesday on legislation to codify abortion rights into law, in reaction to the leaked draft, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on Sunday. "Every American will see how every senator stands," the New York Democrat said at a news conference in New York.

On Sunday, House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, told CBS' Face the Nation program: "This is about something so serious and so personal and so disrespectful of women."

Midterm elections impact

The intensity of feeling on both sides of the abortion issue ensures that it will be a factor in the midterm congressional elections in November.

Brian Burch, president of CatholicVote, a political advocacy group, told Fox News Digital over the weekend that he believes Democrats face hard choices come November.

"Catholics are very practical voters, which is why many of them swing both of the political parties. I think Democrats need some Catholics in order to win many key races, and to the extent that Democrats align themselves with the extreme left, I think they're playing with fire," Burch said. The Catholic Church opposes abortion.

John White, a professor of politics at the Catholic University of America in Washington, told Fox News Digital of the protests: "I'm not sure that they move public opinion all that much. You're just seeing the activists on both sides here. I think the issue is a complicated one, public-opinion-wise, and I think that it's more nuanced than people believe."

Of the issues facing voters in the fall, he said: "Is it going to be inflation, the economy or is it going to be this issue? I still think it's inflation and the economy, generally."

Agencies contributed to this story.