U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell on May 19 blocked President Donald Trump’s administration from restructuring the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), replacing its leadership, and assuming control of its office building.
USIP was established by Congress in 1984 as an “independent nonprofit corporation,” which receives federal and private funding to promote peace through education and diplomacy.
The matter began with a Feb. 19 Trump executive order declaring USIP “unnecessary,” and calling for the organization’s activities to “be eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law.”
Its board of directors is made up of 13 members: Ten are acting members, appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The other three are “ex officio” members, meaning they hold their seats because of their placement in the federal government.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Vice Admiral Peter A. Garvin, president of the National Defense University, hold these “ex officio” seats.
On March 14, Trent Morse of the Presidential Personnel Office fired USIP’s acting board members by email.
That same day, its president, George Moose, was fired by the ex officio members and replaced with Kenneth Jackson, an official from the U.S. Agency for International Development.
On March 18, in the middle of this shake-up, USIP and several of its fired board members sued the government, naming Trump, Jackson, Hegseth, and Rubio as co-defendants.
Howell initially declined to block the administration’s moves on March 19, while the case was pending before the court, because she felt the plaintiffs’ claims would not succeed on the merits.
The board members and USIP president Moose protested against the firings and resisted the takeover of its Washington headquarters, but were unsuccessful.
The administration eventually fired all but a handful of USIP’s staff, cancelled all of its programs.
It transferred control of USIP’s headquarters to the General Services Administration and leased its office space to the Department of Labor.
In her ruling, Howell sought to define USIP’s role in the federal government.
The plaintiffs had argued that USIP is a fully independent entity, and not part of the government, or at the very least, not part of the executive branch.
Its statutes say the board members can only be removed by the president: “In consultation with the board, for conviction of a felony, malfeasance in office, persistent neglect of duties, or inability to discharge duties.”
A board member may also be removed by a vote of eight other board members, or with a majority vote from members of the House Committees on Foreign Affairs and Education and Labor, and the Senate Committees on Foreign Relations and Labor and Human Resources.
The Trump administration had argued that it was part of the executive branch, since it performed diplomatic functions.
Since it is part of the executive branch, federal attorney Brian Hudak argued, Trump was entitled to fire its board despite the statutory limitations.
Judge Howell took a middle-of-the-road view and said that USIP is part of the federal government, but not strictly part of the executive branch.
“Instead, USIP supports both the executive and legislative branches as an independent think tank that carries out its own international peace research, education and training, and information services,” she stated.
“Defendants’ subsequent actions that flowed from the improper removal of USIP’s leadership in March 2025 are thus also unlawful,” including the termination of its grant programs and the firing of its staff.
She also declared the transfer of USIP’s headquarters illegal and has blocked the government from “trespassing” on those headquarters or maintaining control of its computer systems.
