Rule of Law Clinic Files Amicus Brief on Dismantling of U.S. Institute of Peace
A bipartisan group of former senior public officials, civil servants, and military service members filed an amicus brief challenging the Trump administration’s gutting of the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) as an exercise of “unchecked authority” that “risks permanent damage to the constitutional framework that has undergirded our foreign policy and national security since the Founding.”
The group consists of six flag-rank officers from the U.S. Army, Navy, and Marine Corps, 86 former ambassadors, and other senior national security personnel up to the highest level of U.S. national security. The group spans across the political aisle — including public officials who worked under the past eight presidential administrations and includes former National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, former CIA Director William Burns, former Ambassador to the United Nations Thomas Pickering, and former Commanding General of Central Command and Special Envoy for Qatar and Middle East Peace General Zinni. They are represented by the Peter Gruber Rule of Law Clinic at Yale Law School and Williams & Connolly LLP.
USIP is an independent nonprofit created by Congress that functions to provide education, training, and research opportunities to the public to advance “peace by preventing, mitigating and resolving violent conflict abroad.”
In March 2025, the Trump administration summarily claimed authority over the Institute and fired most of its leadership through an executive order, in violation of the protections Congress put in place when it created the organization. When employees challenged the order in court, Judge Beryl A. Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia called the order a “gross usurpation of power” and temporarily blocked the firings by issuing a preliminary injunction. The government appealed the order, and the case is now pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
The government argues that USIP is an arm of the executive branch and that the president thus has unilateral authority to disband the organization. The brief argues that Congress designed the Institute as an independent organization that operates for the benefit of the public. According to the signers of the brief, the fact that the Institute is independent from the executive branch is precisely what makes it “an effective partner to both Congress and to executive branch officials addressing challenges in conflict zones.”
According to amici’s counsel, Sterling Professor of International Law Harold Hongju Koh, “The Framers intended that the three branches of the federal government share foreign policy powers, and Congress created the United States Institute of Peace as part of its power to build peace, not just to declare war. The Institute’s activities fall outside the limited zone of exclusive executive foreign affairs power and thus the president lacks legal authority unilaterally to fire its leaders and dismantle its operations.”
The Peter Gruber Rule of Law Clinic at Yale Law School was founded in 2016 to address threats to the rule of law by Koh and William O. Douglas Clinical Professor of Law Michael Wishnie ’93. The clinic is now led by Koh, Aharon Barak Distinguished Rule of Law Fellow Bruce C. Swartz ’79, Peter Gruber Rule of Law Fellow Sonia Mittal ’13, as well as Visiting Lecturers in Law Eugene Fidell, Margaret Donovan, and Justin Cole ’23.
Current Yale Law students and clinic members who worked on the brief include Kaitlyn Van Baalen ’27, Madeline Babin ’26, Elizabeth Bailey ’27, Cameron Cucuzzella ’27, Emily Elledge ’26, Isabel Gensler ’26, Riler Holcombe ’26, Caroline Kapp ’27, Samantha Kiernan ’26, and Jake Mattis ’26. Attorneys David S. Kurtzer-Ellenbogen and Jonathan E. Spratley of Williams & Connolly LLP and Rebecca LeGrand of LeGrand Law PLLC also represent amici.
