Since taking office, the administration withdrew from an EU-led international group tasked with punishing Moscow for violating international law. The White House also scaled back the Justice Department’s War Crimes Accountability Team and eliminated a program to seize assets of sanctioned Russian oligarchs.
Additionally, two sources told The Washington Post that the administration abolished a congressionally mandated intelligence coordinator position responsible for collecting data on Russian crimes across U.S. government agencies.
This role, established through bipartisan legislation authored by Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colorado) and former Rep. Michael Waltz (R-Florida), now a national security adviser to President Donald Trump, was intended to streamline evidence for international prosecutions.
“The atrocities coordinator position is ... tasked with holding Putin responsible for the crimes he’s committed against the Ukrainian people,” Crow told The Washington Post in a statement. “This position was created by Congress on a bipartisan basis, and the administration must empower whoever serves in this position to carry out their duties as required by law.”
Crow warned that if Trump and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard “want to achieve lasting peace, they must be willing to hold Putin accountable for the crimes he’s committed in Ukraine.” He added that the administration’s actions suggest it is “ready to let him off the hook.”
An interagency working group led by the coordinator was also disbanded.
Experts view these moves as a retreat from the U.S. role as a global defender of the rule of law. Eli Rosenbaum, former head of the Justice Department’s war crimes team, called it a “disturbing retreat” amid Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II.
The coordinator position was housed within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), which has not commented on the decision.
Crow noted that while intelligence has gathered substantial data on Russian crimes, there is no longer a centralized hub to organize it for use in international courts.
The coordinator role was created in December 2022, alongside legislation allowing the United States to share war crimes evidence with the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Defense Department initially opposed the move, citing concerns about setting a precedent for prosecuting American soldiers.
Following bipartisan congressional pressure, evidence sharing with the ICC began in summer 2023 but paused after ICC arrest warrants were issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Transfers resumed in December.
The ODNI coordinated this through the State Department’s Office of Global Criminal Justice, established in the 1990s, which is now slated for reduction under Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s department reforms.
In 2024, the office allocated $1.8 million to support prosecutors in The Hague, but the Trump administration withdrew the United States from this body.
“We had a whole machinery that was supporting Ukraine on multiple fronts — on the battlefield, in the international courts, and on the humanitarian side,” said Beth Van Schaack, who led the Office of Global Criminal Justice until January. “It feels like a real reversal now — an upside-down-world.”