Washington widened its campaign against the world’s only permanent war crimes tribunal on Friday, October 9. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the United States would sanction the International Criminal Court itself, after earlier rounds that targeted its judges, prosecutors and people who work with it, Al Jazeera and CBS News report. “We will ban transactions with this rogue court, cutting off their resources and crippling its ability to operate against us,” Rubio said, according to Military.com. In his statement, carried by the State Department press feed on Forth, he added: “Either the ICC will end its threats, or we will end the ICC.”

The legal mechanics, as outlets describe them, look broad. Military.com reports that the Treasury Department added the Hague-based court to its sanctions list under Executive Order 14203, which President Donald Trump signed on February 6, 2025. The designation freezes the court’s assets held in the United States or controlled by U.S. citizens, permanent residents or businesses, and generally bars them from dealing with the court unless an exception applies, Military.com says. Al Jazeera quotes the order’s language blocking “all property and interests in property” the court holds in the U.S. Al Jazeera puts the court’s staff at about 900 people, and Military.com cites the ICC as saying the designation follows sanctions on 13 court officials; CBS News describes “more than a dozen” judges and prosecutors.

The exceptions seem nearly as important as the ban. Military.com reports that Treasury issued four licenses. General License 13, it says, authorizes transactions needed to maintain or wind down ICC operations and contracts through 12:01 a.m. EDT April 7, 2027, covering member countries’ payments, salaries, health insurance, rent, utilities and routine services. Another license covers telecommunications and enterprise software such as payroll, cybersecurity and data storage, and others cover pensions and the care of detainees, per Military.com. CBS News describes a 180-day window for certain operations, and NPR says the U.S. gave companies six months to wind down ties with the court. The State Department said the exemptions aim to “provide time for States Parties to demonstrate meaningful progress” on resolving U.S. concerns, Al Jazeera reports.

Rubio framed the move as leverage on the court’s member governments. “We have structured this action to provide an opportunity for States Parties to negotiate and present a solution to address our concerns,” he said, according to CBS News. “If these efforts do not bear fruit, we will continue to adjust accordingly.” In a video message aired by NPR, he said: “America never joined the court. We don’t need that court, and we don’t want it.” He also said he expects U.S. allies who rely on American service members for their defense to “rein in” the court, NPR and the State Department statement report.

The court pushed back the same day. The ICC condemned the designation as an attempt to interfere with its work and intimidate those who cooperate with it, calling it “an assault on the rule of law,” CBS News reports. “The Court will continue to fully discharge its mandate, with independence and impartiality,” ICC President Tomoko Akane said, per CBS News. Deputy prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan told Reuters the sanctions deserve condemnation (paraphrased by this desk), adding, “Our work will continue across all our situations, our investigations and our prosecutions,” Al Jazeera reports. In a statement quoted by Al Jazeera, the court asked its member states to redouble support: “History will judge this moment.” CBS News says the court appealed to its 125 member states for resources.

Several close U.S. partners objected in public. The foreign ministers of Canada, Denmark, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom said they “regret and strongly disagree with the announcement of sanctions,” CBS News reports (quote trimmed by this desk). They warned that the measures would have “a significant impact on the Court’s work, its dedicated staff and their families,” according to CBS News, and Military.com reports that they pledged to help sustain the court’s work. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed the U.S. step: “Thank you for your leadership,” he said in a social media statement cited by Al Jazeera.

Why now? The administration points to the court’s Afghanistan investigation, which could reach U.S. military and intelligence personnel, and to its arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant over Gaza, Al Jazeera reports. Neither the United States nor Israel belongs to the Rome Statute, the court’s founding treaty, CBS News notes; the court holds that it can prosecute crimes committed on a member’s territory even by nationals of non-members, according to CBS News and Military.com. NPR reports that no current investigation targets U.S. personnel and that the court suspended its look at the U.S. role in Afghanistan, and Al Jazeera says the court has not sought to prosecute any U.S. citizen.

The timing drew notice. The announcement came hours after the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the Peace Prize to South African jurist Navi Pillay, an ICC judge from 2003 to 2008, CBS News and Al Jazeera report. AP says the move long predated the prize announcement. In a video after her win, Pillay described international law and human rights as under “significant political attack,” citing attacks on the ICC, CBS News reports. William Schabas, an international law professor at Middlesex University, linked the timing to Trump’s view of the Nobel Committee, Al Jazeera reports.

How much damage the sanctions do seems uncertain. Schabas told Al Jazeera the court had prepared a “plan B” for more than a year, including moving some U.S.-made software to European alternatives and ending its relationship with the insurer Axa, and he said the significance still looked unclear (paraphrased by this desk). Mark Kersten, a professor at the University of Fraser Valley in British Columbia, told Al Jazeera that direct sanctions on the court marked advocates’ top fear: “the worst-case scenario has come about.” Military.com notes that the practical effect will depend on the licenses and on whether providers keep doing permitted business.

Open questions this desk will watch: whether member states offer the “solution” Rubio demands before the licenses lapse; whether banks and tech vendors keep serving the court under the exemptions; how legal challenges by rights groups and sanctioned judges in U.S. courts proceed, as Al Jazeera describes; and whether more states follow Chad and Venezuela, which Al Jazeera says moved to withdraw in July.