[3] In April 1992, thousands of "prayer warriors" and anti-abortion protesters met at the entrances of Buffalo Abortion Clinics for a planned month of picketing and blockades, trying to dissuade women from ending their pregnancies.

[9] In addition to committing acts of violence, some anti-abortion activists were known to stalk medical personnel and use their photographs on "Wanted for Murder" posters.

[10] Certain senators and representatives believed that such unlawful conduct was interfering with the constitutional right of women to receive reproductive health care services (abortion in particular), which was guaranteed by the Supreme Court after the ruling of Roe v. Wade in 1973,[11][12] until revoked by the ruling of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization in 2022.

[13] The Act was passed in direct response to the escalation of violent tactics used by anti-abortion activists that culminated in the "Spring of Life" at Buffalo Abortion Clinics, in April 1992[5] and the murder of Dr. Gunn in March 1993.

For this reason the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice provided formal definitions for these terms:[1][18][19] § 248.

According to Cathleen Mahoney, Executive Vice President of the National Abortion Federation and former attorney for the Justice Department, "The amount of [violent] activity really did drop a lot after FACE was enacted and it was beginning to be enforced".

[21] In July 2022, Republican Representative Ted Budd and Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina wrote to the state's Attorney General, Josh Stein, asking him to apply the FACE Act to protect CPCs in North Carolina, saying that there was vandalism at the Mountain Area Pregnancy Services facility.

[22][23] In 1995, American Life League attempted to challenge the FACE Act in The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in a case called American Life League, Inc. v. Reno, but lost when the court upheld the FACE Act.