Several top United Kingdom lawyers, including human rights activist Amal Clooney, have reportedly been warned that President Donald Trump could announce sanctions against them.
The sanctions would be in retaliation for the barristers advising the International Criminal Court in a war crimes case against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
If sanctions are handed down against Amal — a British citizen — she might be prevented from entering the U.S., where she shares a property with husband George Clooney and their two children.
Several top British lawyers, including Amal Clooney, have reportedly been warned about receiving sanctions from President Donald Trump that could affect their ability to enter the United States.
The Financial Times reported last week that the U.K. Foreign Office has cautioned several high-level barristers about the Trump administration leveling sanctions due to the legal advice they provided to the International Criminal Court in a war crimes case against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
In February, Trump issued Executive Order 14203, "Imposing Sanctions on the International Criminal Court," which named British lawyer and ICC prosecutor Karim Khan in its annex — the first barrister to face U.S. sanctions for advising in this case.
Related: International Criminal Court Seeks Arrest Warrants for Israeli Prime Minister and 3 Hamas Leaders
If sanctions against more U.K. lawyers are, in fact, handed down, Amal, 47 — who holds British citizenship — might be prevented from entering the U.S., where she owns a property with husband George Clooney.
Born in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1978, Amal and her family emigrated to the United Kingdom two years later to escape the Lebanese Civil War. She was raised in Buckinghamshire before studying at Oxford and NYU. She is qualified to practice law in the United States — after being admitted to the New York bar in 2002 — as well as England and Wales.
She and Clooney married in September 2014, and share 7-year-old twins, Ella and Alexander.
PEOPLE has reached out to the U.K. Foreign Office, as well as representatives for Amal and her legal chambers, for more information about possible sanctions. A rep for George declined to comment on the Financial Times' report.
In November 2024, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity concerning Israel’s offensive in Gaza. The Israeli leaders have denounced the charges as “absurd and false lies.”
The court also charged three now-deceased leaders of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which launched an attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Trump's February 2025 executive order claimed that, as neither Israel or the United States are party to the Rome Statute — the international treaty which established the ICC — the court "abused its power by issuing baseless arrest warrants" against Netanyahu and Gallant.
Both Israel and the United States signed the Rome Statute in 2000, but later refused to ratify. Palestine ratified the treaty in 2015, meaning any crimes committed in Palestinian territories could be party to ICC jurisdiction.
International criminal lawyer Alexandro Maria Tirelli explains to PEOPLE that there is a stark possibility of U.K. lawyers facing U.S. sanctions, and how Clooney and her fellow lawyers could find themselves barred from entering the country.
Trump's February order invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, the National Emergencies Act of 1976, and the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, also known as the McCarran-Walter Act.
The IEEPA, in particular, allows the president to freeze assets, deny entry into the United States, and prohibit economic transactions to individuals deemed “hostile to American interests.”
Additionally, Tirelli notes that an executive order does not require a criminal conviction or due process. The proof of what constitutes a “threat”in this case would be at the discretion of the Trump administration.
There is also no way to appeal an executive order. Those formally sanctioned would have to file a federal lawsuit, on the basis ofsomething like "violation of the right to due process," "abuse of executive authority," or "infringement of professional freedom."
During the lengthy ensuing legal process, which could last from six to 24 months, the sanctions would remain in place and entry to the U.S. would continue to be denied, Tirelli says.
There is very little precedent for the hypothetical sanctions or legal recourse if they are put into place against British lawyers. Tirelli notes that there is absolutely no record of past U.S. sanctions against foreign lawyers “purely for the exercise of professional legal functions.”
That said, the rumored sanctions do directly contradict the United Nations Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers (1990), which states that governments have a duty to ensure their lawyers “(a) are able to perform all of their professional functions without intimidation, hindrance, harassment or improper interference; (b) are able to travel and to consult with their clients freely both within their own country and abroad; and (c) shall not suffer, or be threatened with, prosecution or administrative, economic or other sanctions for any action taken in accordance with recognized professional duties, standards and ethics."
As for U.S. opposition, in March 2025, when Trump directed U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to threaten sanctions against lawyers, law firms and judges who have taken cases or ruled against him, the American Bar Association spoke out against him.
“We reject efforts to undermine the courts and the profession,” the ABA said in a statement at the time. “We will not stay silent in the face of efforts to remake the legal profession into something that rewards those who agree with the government and punishes those who do not.”
Read the original article on People
