Two anti-abortion advocates have filed a lawsuit against the city of Huntsville claiming a violation of their rights to free speech.

According to a press release from Personhood Alabama, James and Carol Henderson have stood outside Alabama Women’s Center for Reproductive Alternatives for years to “legally advocated for life.”

The couple applies for a special events permit every six months so that they may “sidewalk counsel” women seeking abortions outside the clinic, the lawsuit states. In 2017 new language was added to the permit restricting the volume levels the couple were allowed to engage in.

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The new ordinance reads ““[t]he amplified sound produced by a participant in the event shall not be plainly audible inside adjacent or nearby buildings. The amplified sound is plainly audible if the amplified sound be clearly heard inside an adjacent building by a person using his normal hearing faculties, provided that the person’s hearing is not enhanced by any mechanical device.”

The Hendersons say in their lawsuit the new rule is unconstitutional and forces them to choose “between giving up their right to free speech or proceed with restricted free speech.”

Efforts to contact Huntsville’s city attorney were unsuccessful.

Josie Poland, a clinic escort in Huntsville, said Thursday the Hendersons scream outside the clinic to the point where doctors and patients inside the building can hear them.

“I have no words for their sense of entitlement,” Poland said. “They think their free speech grants them the right to have an audience. I don’t think the first amendment grants them the right to have an audience. It seems to me the employees, the doctors, the business, the patients, their rights end when the protesters rights begin. The police don’t do anything about it.”

Anti-abortion advocates have long kept vigil outside of Alabama abortion clinics, often using public shaming as a way to prevent women from seeking abortions. David Day, a pro-life advocate, has shared photos of women entering and exiting the clinic in Montgomery and regularly livestreams video on his Facebook page.

Amanda Reyes, president of the Yellowhammer Fund and a clinic escort at the West Alabama Women’s Clinic in Tuscaloosa, said the clinic owner had to hire off-duty police to stand guard outside. Reyes said one of the protesters tried to run over an escort in the parking lot.

“These guys, they find out your name. They take pictures of our license [palte],” Reyes said. “We have a nonegagement policy. We don’t talk to them. It’s the same people that come over and over again. We don’t talk to them, but you show up one day and they know your name and know things about you that you did not tell them and so that’s really intimidating.”

The Henderson’s are requesting punitive damages in exchange of the “deprivation of their federal constitutional rights.”