Ilhan Omar renews push for US to join ICC amid Trump pressure

The solution comes days aft US Secretary of State Marco Rubio pledged to ‘dismantle’ the planetary court.

United States Representative Ilhan Omar has pushed backmost against President Donald Trump’s efforts to “dismantle” the International Criminal Court (ICC), alternatively introducing a solution calling connected the state to articulation the tribunal.

The determination came conscionable days aft Secretary of State Marco Rubio pledged to “dismantle the ICC — ceramic by brick, if necessary”, utilizing “all the tools astatine our government’s disposal”.

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Omar’s resolution, introduced connected Wednesday, calls connected the US to articulation the ICC by ratifying the Rome Statute, the court’s founding document.

The solution would besides enactment unit connected the Trump medication to assistance the sanctions and visa restrictions it has placed connected tribunal officials.

Omar, a erstwhile kid exile from Somalia, argued successful a connection this week that joining the tribunal would beryllium a measurement towards fortifying the regularisation of instrumentality astir the world.

“If we genuinely judge successful quality rights and the regularisation of law, we should fortify planetary justness — not undermine it,” Omar said. “The United States should pb by illustration and amusement that nary 1 is supra the law.”

But the Trump medication has lashed retired astatine the ICC for its investigations of US and Israeli personnel.

Neither the US nor Israel is simply a signatory to the Rome Statute, and neither recognises the court’s authority. But some countries person been accused of quality rights abuses successful countries that are ICC subordinate states.

The ICC, for instance, has investigated Israel implicit warfare crimes successful Gaza, issuing apprehension warrants against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and erstwhile Defence Minister Yoav Gallant successful November 2024.

Multiple experts, including astatine the United Nations, person concluded that Israel’s warfare connected Gaza was a genocide against Palestinians.

The US, meanwhile, has been investigated for warfare crimes committed successful Afghanistan pursuing the 2001 invasion, arsenic good arsenic astatine alleged “black sites” wherever prisoners were held.

During his archetypal word and continuing into his second, Trump has taken enactment against the ICC and its officials to penalise those progressive successful specified investigations.

Over the past year, aggregate ICC prosecutors and judges person faced sanctions, arsenic good as rights groups that person provided grounds successful court.

On Monday, Rubio took things further, accusing the tribunal successful a video connection of “waging a warfare against our country, not with bullets oregon missiles, but with statutes, compacts and the unit of alleged planetary law”.

The State Department announced a “whole-of-government response” to weaken the court, saying the medication would enactment to “systematically disable” it.

Steps nether information see appealing to countries that spouse with the US subject and instrumentality enforcement to “reject the ICC’s purported authorization to prosecute American officials and servicemen”.

The announcement besides suggested “increased scrutiny of nations that garbage to cull the ICC’s mendacious authorization portion relying connected US assistance”, arsenic good arsenic “increased sanctions” and question bans for radical and organisations affiliated with the court.

Trump archetypal sanctioned tribunal officials successful 2020 implicit the Afghanistan investigation, earlier erstwhile President Joe Biden lifted the measures.

On Monday, Omar criticised Rubio’s announcement arsenic “reckless and dangerous”.

“I person seen firsthand that impunity breeds much violence,” she wrote, voicing her enactment for the court’s work. “The ICC is simply a important instrumentality for justness erstwhile victims person obscurity other to turn.”

The solution comes arsenic 2 US advocacy groups writer the Trump administration, arguing that the president’s sanctions person forced them to halt their constitutionally protected work.

Both groups person offered enactment for the court’s probe into alleged Israeli warfare crimes successful occupied Palestinian territory. They accidental their enactment is protected nether the First Amendment of the US Constitution.