Preliminary Injunction a Powerful Rebuke as Trump Escalates Campaign to Dismantle ICC
(NEW YORK, N.Y., October 13, 2026) – In a landmark victory for free speech and justice, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York today granted a preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration from enforcing its sanctions regarding the International Criminal Court (ICC) against DAWN and Taxpayers Alliance Against Genocide (TAAG), the two organizations said today.
The court's order in DAWN et al. v. Trump et al. bars federal agencies from imposing civil fines or criminal penalties on the plaintiffs for submitting evidence to the ICC or engaging with sanctioned Palestinian human rights organizations and U.N. Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese. While the court declined to strike down the entire sanctions regime at this stage, its finding that the executive order likely violates the plaintiffs' free speech rights reaffirms that the Constitution protects the right to speak, associate, and engage in Palestine-related human rights advocacy.
"Today, a U.S. federal court has put the brakes in a major way on the Trump administration's efforts to shield from justice the Israeli officials who have perpetrated a genocide and their U.S. backers," said Omar Shakir, executive director of DAWN. "The court ruling makes clear that the law does not permit barring Americans from advocating for justice at the ICC or working with human rights defenders that this administration sanctioned solely for calling for justice for U.S. and Israeli war crimes."
Following the court's decision, DAWN announced that it will immediately resume its advocacy with the ICC to prosecute Israeli and American perpetrators of grave crimes and will work collaboratively with al-Haq, al-Mezan, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), and UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, to the fullest extent permitted by law. TAAG announced that it will move forward with finalizing its evidence submission to the ICC on the role of U.S. officials in aiding and abetting genocide in Palestine.
Executive Order 14203, issued in February 2025, grants administration officials the power to impose sanctions on foreigners for supporting the ICC's investigations into U.S. and Israeli nationals for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide and makes it a federal offense to provide a "service" to—or receive one from—a sanctioned individual or entity. It does so by declaring that such investigations constitute a "national emergency," based on false claims that the ICC lacks jurisdiction over crimes committed by U.S. and Israeli nationals and that those countries "strictly adhere to the laws of war."
The Trump administration has used Executive Order 14203 to sanction ICC prosecutors and judges, as well as leading Palestinian human rights groups al-Haq, al-Mezan and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) and the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese. Because the government can interpret the term "service" to encompass anything that confers a benefit on the recipient, groups like DAWN and TAAG could have faced civil and criminal charges if for engaging in routine advocacy with the sanctioned parties—for example, filing a brief with the ICC encouraging it to investigate possible crimes, sharing evidence or advocacy ideas with Palestinian human rights groups or Ms. Albanese, or working with them on a campaign to lift the sanctions. Faced with that threat, many U.S. groups have halted their ICC-facing work and severed professional ties with the Palestinian human rights groups and Ms. Albanese.
In its ruling, the court, citing rulings in other challenges to the ICC sanctions, found that DAWN and TAAG "demonstrate a likelihood of success on the merits of their claim that the 2025 Order violates their First Amendment rights to speak." The court in particular found that the sanctions represent an unjustified content-based regulation of speech. In addition, the court found that the organizations' self-censorship in the shadow of the sanctions regime constitutes "irreparable harm" that warrants issuing the preliminary injunction.
The court declined to strike down the entire executive order as unconstitutional at this stage. The order, though, makes clear that sanctions cannot be weaponized against the plaintiffs to suppress disfavored viewpoints or firewall Americans from international accountability mechanisms.
"Today's decision is a victory for the First Amendment and an important step in unraveling the ICC sanctions regime," said Joseph Pace, DAWN and TAAG's attorney.
The ruling comes just days after the Trump administration imposed sanctions against the ICC as an institution, undermining the struggle for accountability across the world. This decision–the first by a federal court since the U.S. government's latest attack on the ICC–makes clear that the Trump administration cannot use sanctions to violate the Americans' constitutional rights.
TAAG is an association that was formed to prepare and submit communications to the ICC prosecutor documenting the role of U.S. officials in committing—or aiding and abetting the commission of—war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other grave abuses, and to engage in related research, educational, and advocacy efforts in support of accountability for those abuses.
DAWN, the legacy organization of the late Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, works to promote human rights and combat impunity across the Middle East and North Africa. In recent years, DAWN has conducted significant research and advocacy to hold Israeli and U.S. officials accountable for grave abuses.
In January 2025, just before the issuance of the Trump sanctions, DAWN submitted a 279-page submission to the court urging it to investigate and charge Biden administration officials for their role in aiding and abetting Israeli crimes in Gaza. DAWN also made a 2022 filing to the ICC regarding the Israeli army's Netzah Yehuda Battalion and a 2023 submission identifying Israeli military commanders active in the Gaza war.
The lawsuit, DAWN et al. v. Trump et al., No. 26-cv-5957, was filed on July 15, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, just two days after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio threatened again to dismantle the ICC, including in a July 13 Wall Street Journal op-ed that references DAWN's advocacy for international justice. The complaint challenged EO 14203 and its implementing regulations under the First Amendment, the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause for unconstitutional vagueness, and IEEPA's statutory limits.
The Court gave the parties until October 20 to confer on next steps in the case, in light of this ruling.
"By granting this injunction, Judge Furman has affirmed important First Amendment protections for our work seeking accountability for senior U.S. officials who have aided and abetted the ongoing genocide in Palestine," said Anna Marie Stenberg of TAAG. "This is a significant victory, but our work is far from over. TAAG remains committed to pursuing justice and holding U.S. officials accountable."
