Los Angeles, May 15 (IANS): Thousands of people took to the streets in Los Angeles as part of a nationwide effort to protect abortion rights amid the controversy triggered by news that the Supreme Court could overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.

Saturday's protest drew a massive crowd gathering outside Los Angeles City Hall since morning, reports Xinhua news agency.

More than a dozen politicians, including Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and Senator Alex Padilla, took to the stage and delivered speeches.

"I was proud to join Angelenos at the Bans Off Our Bodies Rally to stand in support of women and reproductive access. Reproductive rights are fundamental human rights. This is the fight of our lives, and we need to unite & ensure we do all we can to protect our future," Garcetti tweeted.

"Wealthy women and well-connected women will have the resources to travel to another state to have an abortion, while women of colour, poor women of colour across this country, are going to suffer and are going to die as a consequence," Los Angeles City Council President Nury Martinez said at the rally.

"Women of colour have limited access to resources and cannot afford to take one day out of work to go have a procedure in another state," she said.

The Women's March Foundation, who organised the event, said it received more than 50,000 signups for the "Bans Off Our Bodies" rally.

Earlier this month, a draft majority opinion leaked from the Supreme Court suggested that it is poised to strike down Roe v. Wade.

"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start," Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the draft majority opinion.

"We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives," the Conservative argued.

The landmark Supreme Court decision in 1973 established a constitutional right to abortion in the US.

A subsequent 1992 decision -- Planned Parenthood v. Casey -- largely maintained that right.