On February 7, Center for International Policy Executive Vice-President Matt Duss joined SiriusXM’s “Mornings With Zerlina” for a discussion of Trump’s proposal to ‘clean out’ the Gaza Strip, the attacks on USAID, the administrative state, and more.
(Washington, D.C.) – In response to President Trump’s imposition of U.S. sanctions on International Criminal Court officials and their families – and potentially foreign nationals who assist them – the Center for International Policy’s Vice President of Government Affairs Dylan Williams issued the following statement:
“Donald Trump’s reimposition of sanctions on ICC officials continues his march to make America a pariah state. In penalizing and hampering the court’s work, Trump is openly undermining its ability to prosecute and deter war crimes and crimes against humanity. Sanctioning court officials, their family members and potentially even the officials of friendly countries provides succor to brutal dictators, aggressors and other human rights abusers around the world whom he admires.
“It is not a coincidence that Trump’s move against the ICC comes just hours after he proposed that the United States carry out a crime against humanity in Gaza, while standing next to a man wanted by the court to answer for war crimes in that territory. The objective of attacking the court is to ensure absolute impunity for those, like both of them, who seek to act unrestrained by any law.
“This latest assault by Trump on the rule of law should be resisted by seeking more, not less, accountability for those who incite, enable or commit atrocities. States that are party to the Rome Statute should reaffirm and carry out their obligations with respect to the court, including the consistent enforcement of its duly issued warrants and orders.
“American lawmakers should treat this attack on a judicial body and its officers as they do Trump’s efforts to destroy domestic institutions of justice, independent of the fact that they may disagree with certain rulings or actions of such bodies. Defending the legitimacy of the ICC is an inseparable part of the fight to protect the rule of law in the United States and around the world from the forces of autocracy and oligarchy. Those who fail to firmly oppose Trump’s attack on the court – or worse, support it – are proving themselves to be only fair-weather friends to democracy and human rights at best, or complicit in their destruction outright.”
Washington, D.C. – In response to the Trump Administration’s recent multiple moves against USAID programs, staff and offices, the Center for International Policy’s Vice President for Government Affairs Dylan Williams issued the following statement:
“President Trump has triggered a full-fledged constitutional crisis with his and Elon Musk’s moves to eliminate USAID. While the impacts of this illegal assault on a Congressionally-authorized agency are already being felt by millions of the world’s most vulnerable people, it also presents a potentially existential threat to the rule of law in the United States.
“President Trump’s orders to stop USAID’s disbursement of duly appropriated funds constitutes an illegal and unconstitutional impoundment. The efforts of Elon Musk and his associates to improperly access private, classified or otherwise protected information – including through attempted intimidation of USAID security personnel – is both unlawful and disturbingly fascistic.
“Statements by both President Trump and Mr. Musk indicating a desire to eliminate or merge USAID with the State Department make clear that they are not undertaking these steps based on any legal authority, but based on personal animus against much of the agency’s work and the agency itself. The Executive Branch cannot unilaterally override and violate laws passed by Congress that provide for the authorization and funding of USAID’s operations – much less a private citizen like Mr. Musk.
“This effort to destroy USAID, especially when coupled with simultaneous moves by Mr. Musk’s associates to take control of the federal government’s main payment system operated by the Treasury Department’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service, is an open attempt by President Trump to assume extraconstitutional powers to create and destroy entire functions of the U.S. Government at will, and single-handedly decide who benefits from its largesse. It is a precedent that has implications far beyond foreign aid, endangering the separation of powers and rule of law central to the maintenance of our democracy.
“We commend the bravery and commitment of USAID personnel and other federal employees who have refused to follow unlawful instructions from the administration or Mr. Musk’s operation. We call on U.S. lawmakers to fulfill their oaths by defending the Constitution against this assault through all available means. And we proudly join with other Americans in resisting this flagrant attempt to subvert the rule of law.”
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The United States remains the world’s largest purveyor of arms, representing nearly 37% of global arms exports between 2015 and 2020. In 2020 alone, the U.S. government approved over $110 billion in arms sales to countries in every corner of the globe. Concerned about U.S. arms facilitating human rights violations, civilian harm in conflict, and corruption, U.S. lawmakers and advocates have long sought to create safeguards against the misuse of the billions in American weaponry shipped abroad every year. End-use monitoring (EUM) is intended to be the answer to those concerns and is aimed at satisfying statutory requirements for the U.S. government to provide assurances that American arms are not being misused, diverted, or otherwise violating the terms of their export. Unfortunately, the current EUM regime fails to address today’s concerns about the human impact of U.S. arms transfers. This brief is intended to give an overview of current EUM policies, dispel commonly held misconceptions of current EUM practice, and offer recommendations for how these regulations could be strengthened.
A detailed look at the shifting and expanding landscape of U.S. security assistance since the September 11th attacks.
The latest annual report on U.S. arms sales trends for calendar year 2020, documenting a sharp surge to $110.9 billion in offers under the U.S. government’s Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program.
A short look of SAM’s latest Arms Sales Trends Report for calendar year 2020.
Nearly twenty years after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and a decade after the death of Osama Bin Laden, the President of the United States continues to draw from a quiver of legal, policy, and technological instruments to use lethal force in secret, directly or through proxies, in countries around the world. Many of the authorities claimed as available to the President to use lethal force today were justified as necessary based on the perception of an urgent threat two decades ago. To enable flexibility and speed, several secret programs and activities were exempted from traditional legal controls, expectations of transparency, and congressional oversight. Meanwhile, covert lethal strikes by armed drones and paramilitary operations with surrogate forces continue to be associated with a lack of accountability for civilian casualties, human rights violations, and U.S. involvement in wars not specifically authorized by Congress.
Recognizing the risks involved with insufficiently unbounded authority to use force, some members of Congress and civil society have sought to curtail the President’s war powers in a “global war on terror” by focusing attention on repealing or constraining the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF). Of equal importance but less commonly examined or scrutinized are the expansive legal arguments, policies, and instruments by which successive administrations have used force with little to no oversight or accountability. Even if calls to end endless war are successful and the AUMF is repealed, these tools, and the power to wield them without oversight, will remain intact. Reestablishing responsible and accountable U.S. foreign policy — especially as the U.S. turns its focus towards great power competition — demands an urgent reevaluation of the sufficiency of legal and policy controls on the use of force and paramilitary operations.
This report, produced by Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC) in partnership with the Stimson Center and Security Assistance Monitor, examines the tradeoffs and consequences involved with the continued use and availability of certain counterterrorism authorities and practices as the “endless war” enters its twentieth year. In examining these tradeoffs, it focuses on the proliferation and normalization of authorities and tools for employing lethal force, including modes of security cooperation where the use of lethal force and civilian harm are reasonably foreseeable outcomes. It focuses on three specific programs that are subject to fewer rules and much narrower forms of congressional oversight than other “conventional” military and intelligence programs, especially those forms of oversight that govern national decisions to go to war; the prevention and accountability for civilian casualties; and the protection of internationally recognized human rights.
The programs and activities covered by this report are 1) the covert use of lethal force by the Central Intelligence Agency (including CIA drone strikes conducted under the authority of U.S.C. Title 10); 2) the provision in secret (covert or clandestine) of support to irregular forces or government security forces by the CIA; and 3) the provision of support to regular and irregular partner forces by U.S. military special operations forces under a specific fiscal authority created after 9/11, namely U.S.C. Title 10, §127e. The report’s main assertion is that the continued availability and, in fact, increased use of a range of “parallel” authorities risks fatally undermining rules that govern and control the use of force.
