Biden OFAC terminates ICC-Related Sanctions Regulations — removal of 31 CFR Part 520

Mechanism

Trump's EO 13928 (11 June 2020, 85 FR 36139) had declared a national emergency under IEEPA over the ICC's assertion of jurisdiction over US and US-allied military and civilian personnel, specifically in the context of the ICC's Afghanistan investigation. The order authorised OFAC to block the property of and prohibit transactions with any foreign person determined to have directly engaged in ICC investigations, arrests, or prosecutions of protected persons (US citizens, LPRs, US government personnel, and personnel of US-allied non-ICC-state parties).

OFAC subsequently codified the prohibitions into 31 CFR Part 520 ("International Criminal Court-Related Sanctions Regulations"). However, no individual SDN designations were ever made under EO 13928 / 31 CFR Part 520 during the Trump administration — the program existed as a legal framework but lay dormant.

Biden's EO 14022 (1 April 2021) revoked EO 13928 and terminated the underlying national emergency, citing the conclusion that sanctions were an ineffective and counterproductive tool for the US-ICC dispute. Following that termination, OFAC issued a final rule under the APA (5 U.S.C. 553) removing 31 CFR Part 520 from the CFR entirely. The rule took effect 6 July 2021.

Downstream implications

• Minimal direct economic effect. No person was ever designated

under the program, so no property was blocked and no SDN List entries required delisting. The removal was a clean regulatory sunset.

• Precedent context. The full cycle — Trump EO 13928 (2020)

creating ICC sanctions, Biden EO 14022 (2021) terminating them — established a reusable legal pathway. Trump's second administration re-activated this pathway via EO 14203 (February 2025), creating a new ICC sanctions program under 31 CFR Part 528 and making the first actual SDN designations against ICC officials. The 2021 removal is thus the mid-point of a three-act ICC sanctions cycle.

• Diplomatic posture. Biden's termination was accompanied by

diplomatic re-engagement with the ICC and rejoining multilateral discussions. The programmatic removal signalled a policy reversal rather than a technical cleanup.

Open questions

• Subsequent re-imposition. EO 14203 (2025) re-created ICC

sanctions under 31 CFR Part 528, rendering the 2021 removal a temporary Biden-era interlude. See action 2025-02-06-us-eo-14203-icc-sanctions-program for the current active program.