ACLU and Knight Institute Urge Court to Construe Foreign Agent Registration Act Narrowly

WASHINGTON — Two U.S. human rights advocates are challenging the Trump administration’s executive order imposing sanctions on the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC). As the lawsuit explains, these sanctions violate the First Amendment by prohibiting the advocates, and other Americans like them, from speaking with the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor, including by providing legal advice, expert analysis, and evidence. “The International Criminal Court is where victims of grave human rights violations turn when national legal systems fail to provide justice,” said Charlie Hogle, staff attorney with ACLU’s National Security Project. “Blocking our clients and others like them from doing their human rights work is unconstitutional.” Under the executive order, people in the U.S. who’ve devoted their lives to seeking justice for the victims of atrocities—like the genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingya people, or gender-based violence committed against Afghan women under the Taliban—could face stiff penalties simply for exercising their constitutional right to engage and advocate with ICC investigators and prosecutors. “Because of this order, I’ve been forced to stop helping the ICC investigate horrific crimes committed against the people of Myanmar, including mass murder, torture, and human trafficking,” said Matthew Smith, co-founder and CEO of Fortify Rights. “This Executive Order doesn’t just disrupt our work—it actively undermines international justice efforts and obstructs the path to accountability for communities facing unthinkable horrors.” Matthew Smith and Akila Radhakrishnan are suing because the executive order forced them to stop working with the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor and indefinitely paused their efforts to hold leading rights violators accountable for horrific crimes. As the lawsuit explains, the First Amendment does not allow the government to impose such sweeping limits on what Americans can say, and to whom they can say it. “Victims of the Taliban’s oppression can’t rely on their own courts for justice. That’s why they turn to the ICC, and why it's so important for me to be able to partner with them in their fight for justice and accountability,” said Akila Radhakrishnan, an international human rights lawyer. “I’m bringing this suit to prevent my own government from punishing me for trying to hold the Taliban accountable for its systematic violence against women and girls from Afghanistan.” The international community, including the United States, established the ICC in 1998 to help maintain international peace and security. The ICC investigates and prosecutes crimes of the severest magnitude—including genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes—when domestic courts are unwilling or unable to do so. Today, 125 countries have joined the ICC’s founding treaty, known as the “Rome Statute.” As the lawsuit explains, although the United States has not ratified the Rome Statute, it has supported the ICC’s critical work on a wide range of matters. This lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the District of Maine by the ACLU and ACLU of Maine on behalf of Matthew Smith and Akila Radhakrishnan. In 2020, when President Trump imposed similar sanctions, the ACLU sued on behalf of human rights experts who were forced to stop working with the ICC. Our clients withdrew their lawsuit when President Joe Biden rescinded the sanctions, but a federal court in a separate suit agreed the sanctions likely violated the First Amendment.

On April 11, 2025, the ACLU and ACLU of Maine filed a lawsuit on behalf of two human rights advocates who, because of an executive order signed by President Trump, have been forced to stop humanitarian work with the International Criminal Court.

Immigrants’ rights advocates sued the Trump administration on Feb. 12, 2025, for access to immigrants transferred from the United States to detention at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba under President Trump’s recent order.

WASHINGTON – The American Civil Liberties Union today filed Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests with more than 40 federal agencies seeking urgent transparency about the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)’s secretive efforts to access and analyze Americans’ sensitive personal information. The ACLU also sent letters to key congressional leaders, calling on Congress to fulfill its constitutional role in conducting immediate oversight of this executive overreach and DOGE’s unchecked access to Americans’ data. The move comes amid growing concerns that DOGE—a hastily assembled office created on President Trump’s first day in office—has been infiltrating federal agencies and gaining access to databases, including Treasury and Health and Human Services (HHS) systems, that contain information on individuals’ finances, health records, and social security data. As DOGE reportedly uses AI to decide what critical public services and programs to cut, failure to protect this data not only creates the perfect storm for an unimaginable data breach or hack but also endangers the health and safety of millions of Americans. Ultimately, Trump cannot slash federal programs – including community health centers, refugee resettlement agencies, and early education programs without massive amounts of data, and DOGE is providing him with everything he needs. In its FOIA requests, the ACLU is asking for any records that reveal whether DOGE or its representatives have sought or obtained access to databases containing personally identifiable information, financial records, healthcare data, or other sensitive government-held records of Americans. The request also seeks information on DOGE’s use of artificial intelligence to analyze government data, raising alarms about the potential for mass surveillance and politically motivated misuse of that deeply personal information. The letter to congressional leaders similarly underscores that the executive branch’s flaunting of long-standing legal requirements and norms undermines Americans’ privacy and Congress’s constitutional role. “The American people deserve to know if their private financial, medical, and personal records are being illegally accessed, analyzed, or weaponized by Trump's unaccountable team of unvetted outsiders,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, deputy director of ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “There’s every indication that DOGE has forced its way into the government’s most tightly protected databases and systems, without consideration of longstanding privacy safeguards mandated by Congress. We need answers now.” DOGE leadership is cynically claiming that its employees and representatives, who are largely housed within government agencies, are not subject to FOIA. That is why – in addition to DOGE – the ACLU has sent FOIA requests to more than 40 agencies that maintain sensitive or personal information, including the Treasury Department, the IRS, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Social Security Administration, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security, among others. “DOGE's access to sensitive personal records of millions of people is deeply alarming and raises significant legal questions,” said Cody Venzke, senior policy counsel at ACLU. “Congress must step up, do its job, and check the president’s overreach.”