US judge blocks Trump sanctions on UN Palestine expert Francesca Albanese

A federal judge in Washington DC has temporarily blocked the Trump administration's sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories.

The ruling found the measures likely violated constitutional free speech protections, with significant implications for US sanctions policy and the extraterritorial reach of the First Amendment.

US District Judge Richard J. Leon, a George W. Bush appointee sitting in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, issued a preliminary injunction on 13 May 2026.

The court found the designation of Albanese as a Specially Designated National constituted a content-based restriction on speech, a category that is presumptively unconstitutional under US law.

Judge Leon held that the only conduct cited to justify the sanctions was Albanese's non-binding recommendations to the International Criminal Court (ICC) — which the court characterised as nothing more than protected expression.

"Albanese has done nothing more than speak," Judge Leon wrote in his 26-page memorandum opinion, adding that her recommendations had no binding effect on ICC decisions.

Who is Francesca Albanese?

Albanese is an Italian legal scholar who has published widely on human rights issues, particularly the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) appointed her Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian occupied territories in April 2022.

In that role, she reports to the UNHRC and the United Nations General Assembly on conditions in the occupied territories. She has published two books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since taking up the mandate.

Albanese holds no formal role at the ICC. However, in July 2025, she published a UN document urging the ICC and national judiciaries to investigate corporate executives for alleged roles in war crimes in the Middle East.

The report specifically named US corporations including Lockheed Martin, Caterpillar Inc., and Chevron, accusing them of furthering what it described as apartheid and settler-colonial destruction.

Executive Order 14203 and the designation of Albanese

President Donald Trump signed Executive Order No. 14203 on 6 February 2025, entitled "Imposing Sanctions on the International Criminal Court," under authority granted by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).

The order declared that ICC efforts to investigate or prosecute US or allied nationals constituted an extraordinary threat to national security, authorising sanctions against those who had engaged with the ICC in such efforts.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio formally designated Albanese under the order on 9 July 2025. Rubio cited her recommendations that the ICC issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

Rubio also cited Albanese's letters to major US corporations urging ICC investigations of their executives. Following the designation, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) added Albanese to the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list.

The designation barred US persons from engaging in any financial transactions with Albanese and prohibited her and her immediate family members from entering the United States.

Impact on Albanese and her family

The consequences were immediate and severe. Albanese was barred from the United States, preventing her from travelling to the UN headquarters in New York. She was also removed from her joint US bank account with her husband.

She was subsequently denied bank accounts at several European banks. Her husband's employer-sponsored health insurer declined to pay her medical expenses, and universities including Georgetown University and Columbia University severed longstanding ties with her.

Albanese's husband, Massimiliano Cali, an Italian economist employed by the World Bank, was also barred from entering the United States as an immediate family member of a designated national.

Cali was suspended from existing World Bank positions and faced severely constrained career prospects within the organisation. He was additionally unable to travel to Washington DC to oversee the couple's property there.

The couple's minor daughter, L.C., a US citizen born in Washington DC in 2013, was effectively unable to travel to the United States given the entry restrictions on both her parents.

L.C. also faced potential civil and criminal liability under the executive order for ordinary transactions with her mother, subject to limited exemptions under a parental licence issued by OFAC.

OFAC issued two partial licences on 22 August 2025: one covering limited transactions related to the family's Washington DC property, and another covering transactions necessary to Albanese's parental role.

The court found, however, that neither licence adequately remedied the constitutional and economic injuries suffered by the plaintiffs.

The lawsuit

Following the designation, the family sought United Nations assistance in challenging the sanctions. The UN declined to contest the designation administratively or through judicial process.

On 14 January 2026, the UN advised that it was not in a position to authorise Albanese to file suit in a US court to contest the sanctions.

The UN cited her institutional immunity as a Special Rapporteur as the basis for that position. One week later, the family authorised their lawyers to prepare legal proceedings.

On 25 February 2026, Cali and his daughter L.C. filed suit against President Trump, Attorney General Pamela Bondi, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, and Secretary Rubio.

The plaintiffs raised claims under the First Amendment, IEEPA, the Fourth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, and the Administrative Procedure Act. They moved for preliminary injunctive relief on their First Amendment and IEEPA claims alone.

A hearing on the motion was held on 1 April 2026. Judge Leon found the First Amendment arguments sufficient to resolve the preliminary injunction motion without reaching the statutory IEEPA claims.

The court's reasoning

The court found Albanese had sufficient connections to the United States to invoke First Amendment protections, despite her current residence in Tunisia.

Those connections included property she owned in Washington DC, her US citizen daughter, a mortgage with a US financial institution, prior US university affiliations, and a record of professional travel to the country.

Judge Leon found the designation constituted a content-based regulation of speech. Albanese holds no formal role at the ICC and cannot direct its actions.

The only conduct cited by Rubio to justify the sanctions was Albanese's non-binding recommendations to the ICC — which the court held amounted solely to protected expression.

The government argued the sanctions targeted conduct rather than speech, characterising Albanese's designation as being based on behaviour rather than words. Judge Leon rejected that framing, finding the triggering conduct was nothing more than communicating a message.

The court further found the sanctions were not narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest, as required under strict scrutiny — the constitutional standard applicable to content-based speech restrictions.

Even accepting that protecting US sovereignty and foreign policy could constitute compelling interests, the court concluded that punishing non-binding advocacy did not advance those interests in a constitutionally permissible manner.

Balance of equities and public interest

The court found the balance of equities and the public interest favoured the plaintiffs. Judge Leon noted that protecting free speech is always in the public interest, regardless of how controversial the speech may be.

The court observed that enjoining an overinclusive sanctions policy did no cognisable harm to the government, given that Albanese's recommendations carry no binding authority over the ICC.

Response to the ruling

Albanese welcomed the court's decision, writing that the interim ruling provided "respite" but emphasising the fight was not over. She noted ICC judges and Palestinian civil society organisations remained sanctioned with no legal recourse.

Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, described the ruling as the right decision and stated that Albanese had been wrongly sanctioned for constitutionally protected speech.

When the sanctions were first imposed, Rubio had accused Albanese of antisemitism, support for terrorism, and contempt for the United States and its allies — characterisations that Albanese and her supporters strongly contest.

Broader context

The ruling followed sustained international controversy over Albanese's conduct as Special Rapporteur. Earlier in 2026, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot publicly called for her resignation, with similar calls from officials in Austria, Germany, Czechia, and Italy.

Some of those statements were subsequently removed or retracted. In response, more than 150 former ministers, diplomats, and ambassadors accused Barrot of spreading disinformation against Albanese.

More than 100 public figures from the cultural and entertainment sectors separately signed an open letter in support of Albanese, amid what supporters described as a coordinated campaign against her mandate.

The preliminary injunction does not resolve the underlying lawsuit. Civil Case No. 26-688 will continue before Judge Leon as the parties litigate the broader constitutional and statutory challenges to the sanctions and Executive Order 14203.