Interview with John Bellinger, former senior legal adviser to the US State Department
John Bellinger was a senior legal adviser to the US State Department and the National Security Council during the George W Bush administration. He discusses the second Trump administration and threats to the rule of law in conversation with IBA Director of Content James Lewis.
James Lewis (JL): Before President Donald Trump’s first term, you and senior Republicans warned that he was going to be the most reckless president in US history. At the end of his first term, you said it was actually worse than you feared. We’re about nine months into the second term. What’s your view of President Trump now?
John Bellinger (JB): Sadly, it’s been doubly worse than we feared. The first term was reckless. A lot of that was really bad policy. Of course, there was the travel ban and [other] things, but I think Trump and the people around him have learned from the first term that they just [don’t] like lawyers, they [don’t] like the rule of law and they don’t like judges. We’re seeing in this first ten months of Trump 2.0 attacks on law firms, on judges, on lawyers. It is clear that President Trump and the people around him have felt that lawyers and judges are in the way of the things they want to do. It’s a full-scale assault on the rule of law.
JL: In your time in the Bush administration, you saw some pretty extreme policy positions close up. And it’s quite a good way of framing how we look at the Trump administration. Perhaps you can give a sense of how far outside the norms the Trump administration is.
JB: President Bush was accused of violations and disregard for international law. As the State Department’s senior international lawyer, it often fell to me to try to explain some of these things. Many of these policies I personally disagreed with but as a lawyer, it fell to me to explain them. Here, though, it seems to be quantifiably different, in that the things that the Trump administration [is] doing in terms of attacks on or disregard for international law make the Bush administration’s policies look mild. Let’s take these boat strikes in the Caribbean. The Trump administration has blown up 16 boats, killing [many] people. It’s a clear violation of international law, and they’ve not even tried to explain why it’s lawful.
Letters being taken off the USAID building in Washington DC following its closure, 7 February 2025. © Mark Alfred/ZUMA Press Wire)
JL: There doesn’t appear to be anyone playing the role you would have done during the Bush administration.
JB: What I think the Trump administration has learned from the first [term] is they don’t want to have dissenting lawyers. They have demanded absolute loyalty, so there does not seem to be any legal disagreement on international issues that we can see, outwardly, and they’ve either just not put lawyers in place, or they’ve chosen carefully [to ensure] absolute fealty. Outwardly, they really have not made an effort to explain the things they’re doing. There’s not an obligation to do it publicly.
I always felt, because I felt that the country and the Bush administration was trying to comply with international law, even though others were disagreeing, that we had an obligation to explain what we’re doing – for example, why we felt justified in killing members of al-Qaeda because they were in an armed conflict with us.
I always felt, because I felt that the country and the Bush administration was trying to comply with international law, even though others were disagreeing, that we had an obligation to explain what we’re doing – for example, why we felt justified in killing members of al-Qaeda because they were in an armed conflict with us. This administration does not seem to be interested in doing that. In fact, even when Congress has asked for [the] legal basis for killing people in the Caribbean, the administration has refused to give it.
JL: We’re not even a year into this Trump presidency. What would you say are the most damaging aspects so far?
JB: At the top of the list, and this is coming mostly from President Trump although to a lesser extent from his attorney general, is the assault on our judiciary. Calling out particular judges for their rulings, calling them radical left lunatics. It undermines public confidence in our judiciary, which has been, for years, our strongest branch of government. [It’s] resulting in threats and even assaults on them.
Second, President Trump has really distanced himself from the rest of the world, even more than in Trump 1.0. Part of it is through these tariffs that he has put on every country. We’re finding our closest allies in Europe, in Asia and elsewhere beginning to distance themselves from the US.
[Another thing] is that President Trump continues to try to divide our country internally. You want to have a leader who is going to try and bring people together, even knowing that at any election half the people didn’t vote for you. President Trump has made pretty clear that he only wants to be the leader of the people that voted for him.
The last thing is President Trump’s war on his own government – shutting down federal agencies like USAID, [closing] Voice of America. It looks like he’s going to take down our Department of Education. And firing people right and left – FBI agents, lawyers at the Justice Department, basically firing anybody who has disagreed with him or had any role in investigating or prosecuting him during the Biden administration. The personal retribution that we’ve seen, that’s also new.
The sanctions he put on law firms early on were really based on two things. One, the [firms] he sanctioned had hired people who had investigated him. And in addition, he felt that these law firms were too liberal, that they had lawyers who were doing pro bono work and were committed to diversity.
JL: How should the legal profession respond?
JB: It’s extraordinarily important for the legal profession to speak out both to defend judges and the judiciary but also to defend lawyers and the rule of law. And of course, we [have seen] that. My law firm in Washington signed an amicus brief supporting the law firms that had been sanctioned and we’ve seen a lot of other law firms that have done that.
In all four of the cases where the law firms had been sanctioned, the judges who heard those cases struck down the executive order sanctioning them. Those are all up on appeal in the DC circuit in Washington. We expect in due course there will be a decision from the appellate court, which we hope will make a resounding defence of law firms and say that it’s not proper for the US president to sanction law firms simply for the people they hire, the clients they have or the cases they take on.
It’s extraordinarily important for the legal profession to speak out both to defend judges and the judiciary but also to defend lawyers and the rule of law
JL: I’m interested in your views on the checks and balances to the Trump administration’s abuses of power. The Supreme Court is tainted. You’re more positive about the judiciary generally but there are challenges there too. Where are the checks and balances?
JB: Our constitutional system is really not working the way it should be, because our Congress, which was set up to be a check and a balance to the executive, even if it’s of the same party, they’ve not been pushing back on improper policies. They have been confirming people who are completely unqualified to be cabinet secretaries. We’re seeing a little bit of reaction recently – I think Congress has been unhappy with these boat strikes and has told the president he needs to explain what his legal basis is.
The judiciary is working, so that is the best check and balance. There have been many district court rulings and even appellate court rulings that have blocked or struck down actions the president is taking. The Supreme Court is [currently] hearing the challenge to the worldwide tariffs.
The press is really important. Unfortunately, two things are happening. One, economically, the press around the world is not in good shape because people are mostly turning to social media and not paying for news. And two, I think President Trump, realising that the press is a check, is constantly attacking the press. He has locked them out of the newsrooms at the Pentagon, at the White House. The press plays a really important role to expose illegality.
Beyond that, civil society [and] law firms, need to push back. When we have a government like this that is acting contrary to our Constitution, contrary to law, every person has a role to play. Some of us can play a bigger role than others. But if nobody does anything, nothing’s going to happen so it’s important that every person plays some role.
JL: You’ve said that one of your big concerns is that this administration is doing everything it can to increase divisions in the US. Political violence is on the rise as well. Is US democracy irrevocably broken?
JB: It’s not irrevocably broken. US democracy is not in a good place. It’s a really uncivil time. This is one of the things that President Trump has become famous for – breaking all norms in terms of attacking people personally. The sad thing is it doesn’t end there. His followers will amplify that and sometimes even follow through with political violence. Of course, we’ve seen political violence on both sides. We’ve seen [the] horrifying killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. What we would like [to] see is our leaders at all levels call for civility, say that there is never any role for violence and that if people have differences, let’s sit down and talk.
JL: What else needs to be done to fix US democracy?
JB: We need to have more leaders. Frankly we need to have more people in the Republican Party who will stand up and say that some of the things that Donald Trump has been saying or doing are wrong. Vice President Dick Cheney was willing, very late in life, to say that Trump is wrong about some of these things and that we need to have a president who will abide by our Constitution and laws.
We’re a country that was founded on the rule of the law and it’s something that should be bipartisan and that everybody ought to support
One of the saddest things is that the words ‘rule of law’ are now viewed by many Republicans and supporters of Donald Trump as somehow a liberal codeword, when, of course, we’re a country that was founded on the rule of the law and it’s something that should be bipartisan and that everybody ought to support.
JL: Turning to international affairs, is dealing with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin the top priority?
JB: President Trump said during his campaign that he would solve the Ukraine war on the first day. That hasn’t happened, and President Trump has been all over the map in both cosying up to Putin, inviting him to Alaska then alternately sanctioning him and then saying he’s going to have nothing to do with him. I think President Trump has realised that this is a difficult problem and that President Putin is not going to roll over either.
JL: On Ukraine, in terms of accountability, we’ve had an International Court of Justice ruling. The International Criminal Court (ICC) has an arrest warrant out for Putin. Is there more that can be done?
JB: We’ve got the work that’s being done on the crime of aggression, which the ICC can’t address, so we’re moving forward with a separate tribunal. What we can do is support the Ukrainians in their investigations of individual war crimes. That’s something where really law firms, civil society and the IBA can provide support to the Ukrainians and to some of the other countries [where similar things are happening] – people need to be held accountable for those things as well.
JL: Should frozen Russian assets be used to help rebuild Ukraine?
JB: Yes. I’ve looked at this very closely. And while it’s not a question that international lawyers can’t debate, the question is: are sovereign funds sovereign under international law forever? A lot of lawyers, including me, have looked at the question of countermeasures. And so, if Russia is violating international law, countries that have been damaged by Russia’s violation of international law can take countermeasures. The response to that is always [that] the countermeasures have to be temporary and reversible. And the answer to that is if Russia comes back into compliance with international law and rebuilds Ukraine, then they can have their sovereign assets back. In the meantime, I am comfortable as an international lawyer using [Russia’s] sovereign assets to pay for the reconstruction of Ukraine.
I am comfortable as an international lawyer using [Russia’s] sovereign assets to pay for the reconstruction of Ukraine
Ukraine is going to have to be rebuilt, Russia caused this war and is continuing to cause it. And it should not be up to the Ukrainians, Europe or the US to have to spend taxpayer money [on rebuilding Ukraine]. That’s obviously a policy argument, but I think it is supported by international law as a countermeasure.
JL: Can the ICC–US relationship survive the Trump presidency?
JB: We’re at a time when the Trump administration has placed sanctions on a number of [ICC] judges and prosecutors.
In the second term of the Bush administration, we had, largely led by me, not a loving embrace of the ICC but essentially a policy that said if the ICC was doing what it was set up to do, such as investigating genocide in Sudan, we would support that. We recognised it had an important role to play in the cause of international criminal justice. That policy was continued under the Obama administration [but] reversed in the Trump administration. That was then reversed in the Biden administration and now we’re back again. It’s possible that under a future Democratic president, it could go back to some sort of a relationship, but right now it’s pretty much in the deep freeze.
This is an abridged version of the interview with John Bellinger. The filmed interview can be viewed in full here.