Summary: ICC judges Kimberly Prost, Solomy Balungi Bossa, and Reine Adelaide Sophie Alapini-Gansou sue Sanctions challenged as exceeding scope of International Emergency Economic Powers Act Trump administration cites national security and foreign policy threats involving ICC On June 24, three International Criminal Court judges sued U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration over sanctions imposed on them last year, arguing the measures were unlawful. In the lawsuit filed in the federal court in Manhattan, judges Kimberly Prost of Canada, Solomy Balungi Bossa of Uganda and Reine Adelaide Sophie Alapini-Gansou of Benin said the sanctions were designed to exert extrajudicial pressure with the objective of punishing and coercing the judges. A White House official said Trump lawfully exercised his authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) in imposing the sanctions, which the official said dealt with "an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States involving the International Criminal Court, including the ICC's illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel." "The Administration will continue to vigorously defend the President's actions — protecting the national security and foreign policy of our country first and foremost," the official said. The State and Treasury departments did not respond to requests for comment. The Trump administration imposed sanctions on several judges at the International Criminal Court last year in an unprecedented retaliation over the war tribunal's issuance of an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a past decision to open a case into alleged war crimes by U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Sanctions severely hamper individuals' abilities to carry out even routine financial transactions as any banks with ties to the United States, or that conduct transactions in dollars, are expected to have to comply with the restrictions. The ICC, which was established in 2002, has international jurisdiction to prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in member states or if a situation is referred by the U.N. Security Council. Although the ICC has jurisdiction over war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in its 125 member countries, some nations, including the U.S., China, Russia, and Israel, do not recognize its authority. The Trump administration's dislike of the court goes back to Trump's first term. In 2020, Washington imposed sanctions on then-prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and one of her top aides over the court's work on Afghanistan. JUDGES CHALLENGE LEGAL BASIS The lawsuit argues that the sanctions were against the law as they exceeded the scope of IEEPA and were not based on a genuine national emergency or extraordinary threat. "The Sanctions Regime ... is designed to exert extra-judicial pressure on these judges and their colleagues on the ICC bench by targeting their financial and other personal interests, with the objective of punishing them for prior judicial decisions and coercing them into prioritizing their private interests over deciding cases on the basis of the law and facts," the lawsuit said. "Being subjected to such sanctions under IEEPA is tantamount to the financial death penalty. Due to the sanctions, Judges Prost, Bossa, and Alapini-Gansou are no longer able, among other things, to use credit cards; access banking services; use common online platforms, such as Amazon and Google; book travel; and in some cases, obtain health insurance," it said. The judges also said that the sanctions bar the submission of evidence and argument in any pending or future proceeding before them. Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis

Summary: Supreme Court issues five rulings amid major Trump cases Court's conservative majority includes three Trump appointees Court struck down Trump's global tariffs under emergency law     The U.S. Supreme Court's current term is rapidly approaching a climactic finale in which some of its biggest cases yet to be decided will test Donald Trump's aggressive efforts to expand presidential authority. The court issued five rulings on June 23, with more expected on June 25. Its annual terms run from early October to around the end of June, sometimes spilling into July. The court has not announced when it will wrap up its term and begin a summer recess. The court often waits until the end of its term to issue its most consequential rulings. This year is unusual for the number of major cases lingering that involve the critical issue of presidential power — and Trump's particularly bold use of it. The cases involve his efforts to limit birthright citizenship, fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, oust Democratic members of independent agencies and terminate a humanitarian legal status protecting hundreds of thousands of Syrian and Haitian immigrants from deportation. BLOCKBUSTER CASES "It's totally normal for the most important cases of the term to come out in the last few days. What is unusual is that there are so many blockbuster cases," said University of Michigan constitutional law professor Sam Erman, an expert on the Supreme Court. "We've seen a lot of novel uses of presidential power since Trump took office, and that's produced some big questions about the nature of government and how presidential power works. So that's produced a very active Supreme Court term, and a big bang at the end," Erman said. Trump has pushed to expand presidential powers during his second term in office in domestic affairs and foreign policy, drawing hundreds of legal challenges on numerous fronts. The Supreme Court, whose 6-3 conservative majority includes three justices Trump appointed during his first term, has shown it is receptive, backing many of his emergency requests to implement policies impeded by lower courts while litigation over their legality continues. Over the years, the court's conservative majority has increasingly embraced a legal theory called the "unitary executive" that places power over the U.S. government's executive branch solely in the hands of the president. But the embrace may have its limits. Of the major Trump cases on which the justices heard arguments, many court watchers have predicted that Trump has a better chance of vindicating his firings of independent federal commission members than his actions on birthright citizenship or Cook. "They have a view of a strong executive, but it's not an unlimited executive," Erman said of the conservative justices. "So when he is essentially advancing their project, he's pretty likely to win." The court is unlikely to be sympathetic that Trump, through an executive order, can restrict birthright citizenship, Erman said. The Republican president's order, a politically charged part of his hardline immigration approach, would upend a longstanding interpretation of the Constitution's 14th Amendment provision recognizing the citizenship of people born in the United States. A REBUKE ON TARIFFS The court already delivered a major rebuke of Trump's audacious wielding of power, striking down in February sweeping global tariffs that he had imposed under a law meant for national emergencies. That ruling prompted Trump to lash out at the court in general and disparage the justices who ruled against him. Other major cases that do not directly involve Trump, including those that will impact elections, transgender rights, and state firearms laws, also remain to be decided. The court is weighing a challenge by Republicans in Mississippi to a state law that allows a five-day grace period for mail-in ballots received after Election Day to be counted — a case that could lead to stricter voting rules around the country. In a case involving Vice President JD Vance, the court is also set to rule on a Republican-led bid to strike down on free speech grounds federal limits on spending by political parties in coordination with candidates. The court's conservative majority in April gutted a pillar of the Voting Rights Act, a landmark 1965 civil rights law that aimed to prevent racial discrimination in voting. That ruling prompted a frenzied round of redistricting across the South to eliminate U.S. House of Representatives districts where Black voters make up a majority or near-majority, as Republican-led states scrambled to take advantage of the decision. The Republicans are seeking to retain control of Congress in the November midterm elections. Black voters tend to support Democratic candidates. The court is also weighing, in cases from West Virginia and Idaho, whether to uphold state laws banning transgender athletes from female sports teams amid escalating efforts nationwide to restrict the rights of transgender people. On gun rights, the court is set to deliver its judgment on a challenge — backed by Trump's administration — to a Hawaii law that restricts the carrying of handguns on private property open to the public, like most businesses, without the owner's permission. The court last week unanimously rejected a position taken by Trump's administration that had threatened the gun rights under the Constitution's Second Amendment of millions of Americans who use marijuana and own firearms. Reporting by Andrew Chung; Editing by Will Dunham

Summary: US Supreme Court reverses 9th Circuit ruling on Cisco case Lawsuit alleged Cisco enabled Golden Shield surveillance system Alien Tort Statute limits corporate liability for overseas abuses The U.S. Supreme Court further limited the reach of a federal law used to hold corporations liable for human rights abuses committed abroad, as it issued a ruling on Tuesday ending a lawsuit by members of the Falun Gong movement accusing Cisco Systems of facilitating religious persecution in China. The justices reversed a lower court's decision that had breathed new life into the 2011 lawsuit, which was brought under the Alien Tort Statute of 1789. The suit had alleged that Cisco knowingly developed technology that allowed China's government to surveil and persecute Falun Gong members. The Alien Tort Statute had been dormant for nearly two centuries before lawyers began using it in the 1980s to bring international human rights cases in U.S. courts. The Cisco case posed the question of whether the law creates liability for corporations that "aid and abet" human rights abuses, a form of what is called accomplice liability. The lawsuit accused San Jose, California-based Cisco of knowingly designing and implementing the "Golden Shield," an internet surveillance system used by the Chinese Communist Party to target dissidents. The plaintiffs said China used the system to track and then torture Falun Gong members. Cisco called the allegations unfounded and offensive. President Donald Trump's administration sided with Cisco in the case. The Human Rights Law Foundation, a nonprofit organization in Washington, sued Cisco on behalf of a group of Falun Gong members. A judge dismissed the lawsuit in 2014, saying the alleged conduct was not sufficiently connected to the United States for the case to proceed. The lawsuit stalled for many years, in part because of a series of Supreme Court decisions since 2013 limiting the Alien Tort Statute's reach, making it more difficult to hold U.S. corporations legally liable for human rights abuses. Falun Gong, founded in China in 1992, was banned by China's government in 1999 after thousands of members appeared at the central leadership compound in Beijing in silent protest. The group has called for people to renounce the ruling Chinese Communist Party. Falun Gong members founded a right-leaning U.S. media outlet called The Epoch Times that has been heavily critical of the Chinese Communist Party and supports Trump. The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals revived the case in 2023 and allowed it to move toward discovery, the evidence-gathering phase before a trial. The 9th Circuit decided that the plaintiffs had plausibly alleged "that Cisco provided essential technical assistance to the douzheng (crackdown) of Falun Gong with awareness that the international law violations of torture, arbitrary detention, disappearance and extrajudicial killing were substantially likely to take place." The Supreme Court in 2013 and 2018 cases limited the ability of plaintiffs to sue corporations in U.S. courts under the Alien Tort Statute for overseas human rights violations. The court said in those rulings that there needed to be a strong connection between the alleged conduct and actions that took place in the United States. In a 2021 opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court threw out a lawsuit accusing Cargill Inc and a Nestle SA subsidiary of knowingly helping perpetuate slavery at Ivory Coast cocoa farms, ruling that the plaintiffs did not show that any of the relevant conduct took place within the United States. Reporting by Jan Wolfe; Editing by Will Dunham