The Division of Justice is exploring potential prison prices in opposition to former U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) officers who tried to dam the Trump administration’s management modifications on the federally funded assume tank Monday, a senior DOJ official advised the Every day Caller Information Basis.
The official, who requested anonymity, advised the DCNF the DOJ is analyzing whether or not sure USIP actions — such because the elimination and destruction of inside and exterior door locks — created unlawful hearth hazards. The official additionally flagged the widespread distribution of inside flyers instructing USIP employees to not cooperate with incoming Trump administration officers as doubtlessly obstructive conduct. The DCNF was the primary to report on USIP’s inside flyer marketing campaign and destruction of door locks. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Inside A Taxpayer-Funded Assume Tank’s Aborted Insurrection Towards DOGE)
“Eleven board members had been lawfully eliminated, and remaining board members appointed Kenneth Jackson performing president,” Anna Kelly, White Home deputy press secretary, beforehand advised the DCNF. “Rogue bureaucrats won’t be allowed to carry companies hostage. The Trump administration will implement the President’s government authority and guarantee his companies stay accountable to the American folks.”
{A photograph} of a destroyed handbook locking mechanism on a first-floor door outdoors of the U.S. Institute for Peace (USIP) on March 18, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Picture by Thomas English/Every day Caller Information Basis)
The inquiry — which stays in its early phases, the official emphasised — follows a contentious standoff Monday after former USIP management tried to dam the set up of Kenneth Jackson, who President Donald Trump appointed because the institute’s new president on March 14. The Trump administration decided the institute had did not adjust to a Feb. 19 government order requiring federally funded organizations like USIP to scale operations all the way down to their naked statutory minimums, triggering a management shakeup the institute tried to withstand.
USIP management started getting ready for a confrontation weeks earlier than the chief order was issued. A Feb. 6 inside doc completely obtained by the DCNF outlined plans to disclaim constructing entry to outdoors officers and reasserted the institute’s discretion over safety techniques and amenities. Flyers with the names and images of Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) officers had been posted all through the constructing, instructing employees to report their presence and keep away from dialog.
(Left) A photograph of a flyer distributed broadly all through the U.S. Institute of Peace headquarters forward of the Trump administration’s arrival. (Proper) The identical flyer pictured propped in opposition to the window of a safety guard sales space outdoors USIP’s headquarters, each taken on March 18, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Picture by Thomas English/Every day Caller Information Basis)
After Jackson and different DOGE officers arrived on March 14 with regulation enforcement and a duplicate of Trump’s order, they had been turned away by USIP’s authorized counsel, sources beforehand advised the DCNF. Over the next weekend, USIP management escalated its resistance — terminating its non-public safety agency, disabling web and telephone techniques and resorting to walkie-talkie communication contained in the constructing.
DOGE officers returned Monday to seek out the constructing locked down and employees barricaded on the fifth flooring. USIP officers known as the Metropolitan Police Division (MPD), sources beforehand advised the DCNF, who solely later arrived on the request of the U.S. Lawyer’s Workplace for D.C. after stories of obstruction by institute employees. MPD entered the fifth flooring by way of emergency stairwells and eliminated former USIP President George Moose and different senior officers from the premises.
Whereas a federal decide declined to subject a restraining order halting the management transition Wednesday, she sharply criticized DOGE’s cooperation with regulation enforcement, regardless of the circumstances surrounding USIP’s refusal to conform. (RELATED: Taxpayer-Funded Assume Tank’s Authorized Bid To Repel DOGE Goes Down In Flames)
The DOJ official didn’t specify which people had been below investigation or when a call on prices could be made.
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