The group that sought to plaster images of the Prophet Muhammad on Washington, D.C., public transportation has sued the Transit Authority on charges it violated the group's First Amendment rights by refusing to post the ads.
Metro banned all political ads after the American Freedom Defense Initiative submitted an image of Muhammad to run as an advertisement on D.C. buses and train stations.
Pamela Geller, founder of AFDI, submitted the "Support Free Speech" ad depicting the winning entry of the controversial "Draw Mohammad" contest to the D.C. Metro Authority. The May event led to a deadly shooting in Garland, Texas.
"Running and hiding is no strategy in a war. Operation Fetal Position is a recipe for disaster," Geller said Thursday in a statement.
AFDI has run controversial ads on subways and buses in other cities across the country as well — among them Chicago, Philadelphia and San Francisco. In 2012, they were able to get another poster deemed offensive to Muslims on D.C.’s Metro.
The group is listed as an anti-Muslim hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
