Executive Order to Combat Wrongful Detention: Protecting Americans Abroad
The Trump administration is set to introduce an executive order that will establish a designation for state sponsors of wrongful detention, allowing the U.S. to penalize countries that unlawfully detain or take U.S. nationals as hostages. The goal is to discourage Americans from traveling to such countries and urge the immediate release of detained Americans. This measure is inspired by the designation of state sponsors of terrorism and will provide the State Department with tools to sanction nations that use detained Americans for political purposes and potentially impose travel restrictions on U.S. passport holders. The number of Americans detained abroad is not publicly disclosed by the U.S. government, but advocacy groups report that at least 54 Americans were wrongfully detained or held hostage in 17 countries in 2024.
The State Department issues travel advisories with four levels of risk, with the highest being "Level 4: Do not travel." Currently, there are 21 countries on the "Do Not Travel" list, some of which pose wrongful detention as a risk to travelers, including Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, Venezuela, and North Korea. While most U.S. nationals detained overseas are held through legitimate law enforcement and judicial processes, the Robert Levinson Act, passed during President Trump's first term, allows the State Department to determine if a U.S. national is wrongfully detained based on various criteria, such as the fairness of the country's judicial system and evidence of innocence.
Robert Levinson, a former FBI and DEA agent, was kidnapped in Iran in 2007, and the U.S. government believed he was wrongfully held by the Iranian government. Despite intelligence suggesting his death in 2020, his family continues to advocate against hostage-taking. The planned executive order comes in response to recent cases where foreign countries arrested American citizens on questionable charges and later exchanged them for prisoners held in the U.S. For instance, journalist Evan Gershkovich and Marine veteran Paul Whelan were jailed in Russia on espionage charges before being released in a complex 2024 trade involving the return of a convicted murderer to Russia by the German government. Additionally, WNBA star Brittney Griner and American schoolteacher Marc Fogel were released from Russian prisons in exchange for prisoners held in the U.S.