Federal Courts Are Blocking Trump's ICC Sanctions on First Amendment Grounds. Here Is Where Things Stand.

What the Sanctions Actually Do

In February 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14203, directing the Treasury Department to impose asset freezes, travel bans, and service restrictions on ICC officials involved in investigating U.S. or Israeli nationals. Since then, the administration has expanded those sanctions to cover at least 11 ICC officials, including nine judges and chief prosecutor Karim Khan, according to Harvard Law School's Program on International Law and Armed Conflict.

The administration's legal rationale: the ICC has no jurisdiction over the U.S. because the U.S. never ratified the Rome Statute, the 1998 treaty that created the court and now counts 125 member states.

Harvard Law Professor of Practice Alex Whiting, a former ICC deputy specialist prosecutor, calls that argument neither novel nor particularly strong. "The argument that the court is unlawfully exercising jurisdiction is an argument the U.S. has been running for a long time; however, until last year, the government had kind of abandoned that position," he told a Harvard Law panel. "There was a consensus on both sides, Democrats and Republicans, that that argument really was not a winner."

Whiting was careful to add context: the U.S. has never been enthusiastic about the ICC, and support for the court has been waning across the broader international community as well.

The American Caught in the Middle

The practical bite of the sanctions landed on a specific American: Eric Iverson, a fifth-generation South Dakotan, U.S. Army JAG Corps veteran, and ICC prosecutor since 2010. He is the lead counsel on cases against former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who faces genocide charges, according to Human Rights First, which filed suit on his behalf in May 2025.

Because Khan, Iverson's ultimate supervisor, is now on the same Treasury Department sanctions list used for terrorists and human rights abusers, Iverson faces potential criminal prosecution or steep civil financial penalties simply for continuing his job. Providing "services" to a sanctioned individual is a federal offense.

Human Rights First President and CEO Uzra Zeya framed the stakes plainly: "The possibility that a U.S. veteran who works to hold war criminals accountable could be prosecuted for doing his job sends a chilling message to all who fight for human rights."

The administration has not publicly addressed Iverson's specific situation. The sanctions order does not carve out exemptions for American citizens already employed at the court.

Courts Push Back

Two separate federal court actions have complicated the administration's position.

In Smith v. Trump, the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine granted a preliminary injunction in July 2025, prohibiting the administration from penalizing human rights advocates Matthew Smith and Akila Radhakrishnan for communicating with the ICC's Office of the Prosecutor. The court found the advocates were likely to succeed on their First Amendment claim, according to the ACLU of Maine, which brought the case.

The court's reasoning was direct. The executive order's speech restrictions, which bar Americans from providing legal advice, expert analysis, or evidence to ICC prosecutors, constitute unconstitutional limits on who Americans can talk to and what they can say.

Separately, Human Rights First's lawsuit on Iverson's behalf, filed in May 2025, is still working through the courts.

The Strongest Case for the Administration

The opposing argument deserves a fair hearing. Supporters of the sanctions point out that the ICC has investigated Americans and allies for conduct in conflict zones where those countries never consented to the court's jurisdiction. That is a genuine structural problem with how the Rome Statute was drafted, not a manufactured grievance.

Israel, for instance, faces ICC arrest warrants for senior officials. The U.S. views Israel's legal exposure as a direct threat to an ally's sovereignty. If the ICC can reach anyone whose actions touch a member state's territory, the jurisdictional logic could theoretically ensnare U.S. military personnel who operate globally.

The Trump administration's first term made similar moves against ICC officials investigating alleged U.S. war crimes in Afghanistan, and the Biden administration reversed them. The pattern reflects a genuine bipartisan discomfort with ICC jurisdiction, even if the current approach is more aggressive.

Whiting acknowledged this much: the administration is not inventing the concern. It is escalating a decades-old dispute in a new direction.

What Has Not Been Resolved

No charges have been filed against Iverson or any other American ICC employee as of June 24, 2026. The preliminary injunctions are not final rulings. A preliminary injunction means the court finds a likely First Amendment violation, not a proven one. The underlying constitutional questions will be litigated further.

The ACLU's staff attorney on Smith v. Trump, Charlie Hogle, framed the core issue: "The First Amendment does not allow the government to impose sweeping limits on what Americans can say and who they can say it to."

The administration will almost certainly appeal. If it does, the circuit courts will have to decide whether the president's foreign-policy and national-security powers override First Amendment protections when the speech in question involves a foreign international body the U.S. has formally designated as a threat. That question has no clean precedent.