SERVING AMERICA, STRANDED ABROAD: THE GOVERNMENT’S DUTY TO ITS DIPLOMATIC COMMUNITY
Author: Sophie Butler, Associate Editor
I. Introduction
On February 28th, 2026, headlines broke following the launch of the U.S. military’s Operation Epic Fury against Iran, alongside reports of Iranian retaliatory strikes targeting Kuwait – a close U.S. ally.[i]
My father has served the U.S. as a career diplomat for nearly 30 years. I have joined him across the globe. Those in diplomatic service maintain an expectation that they can rely on the U.S. government to safely evacuate its personnel–especially spouses and children.[ii] This was my personal understanding as well. Although federal law places emergency-planning responsibilities to rest with the government, particularly the Department of State with respect to U.S. personnel and their families, the President retains a duty to take necessary and proper action in carrying out evacuation measures.[iii] Given that evacuation decisions necessarily remain largely within Presidential discretion, the government should establish clearer and more consistent standards for advance planning and communication when foreseeable military action puts diplomatic posts at heightened risk.
Operation Epic Fury exposes the consequences of that gap: when the United States initiates military action that places its diplomatic community at a heightened risk, evacuation planning and communication remain largely matters of executive discretion.[iv] The government should therefore establish clearer and more uniform procedures for protecting and communicating with diplomatic personnel, their families, and other American citizens abroad before foreseeable military escalation. Such procedures would enable the government to pursue its policy objectives while minimizing risks to Americans overseas and ensuring their safety is not neglected, instead of what is currently in place, which is a basic and generic Emergency Action Plan for every post.[v]
II. Legal Governmental Duty to Their Citizens
The U.S. Government has an official duty to plan and maintain emergency action plans for U.S. citizens and their families who are on official orders on behalf of the U.S.[vi] Federal law further establishes the government’s responsibilities towards Americans overseas, including a political duty to assist citizens who are wrongfully imprisoned under 22 U.S.C. § 1732.[vii] Executive Order No. 12,656 § 1302(f) reinforces this obligation by requiring the United States to prepare for emergency evacuations.[viii] Similarly, 22 U.S.C. § 4802(b) outlines the Secretary of State’s responsibilities for protecting U.S. employees and citizens abroad.[ix]
In Sadi v. Obama, United States citizens who were in Yemen sued President Obama, his Secretary of State, and other key federal players in hopes of urging the federal government to evacuate U.S. citizens in Yemen.[x] During this time, Yemen was in a civil war, thus trapping U.S. citizens as tensions escalated into a proxy conflict.[xi] The District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan granted the government’s motion to dismiss, therefore denying the 36 members of Sadi’s complaint.[xii] Most closely related to evacuation measures is the court’s holding that Sadi’s claims are those of nonjusticiable political questions.[xiii] Specifically, the District Court noted that “Plaintiffs interpret 22 U.S.C. § 4802 as imposing upon the Executive branch a duty to conduct evacuation operation when U.S. citizens' lives are endangered.”[xiv] The District Court articulated that 22 U.S.C. § 4802 “provides absolutely no standards by which this Court could determine whether U.S. citizens' lives are endangered, whether their evacuation would be ‘safe and efficient,’ or by what means evacuation should be executed…[and] appears to afford significant discretion to the Secretary of State to make those value determinations.”[xv] Ultimately, the District Court found that they “still lack[ed] the resources to determine whether evacuation is a prudent measure. These fact-based judgments have been committed to the discretion of the Executive branch, to be made on a case-by-case basis.”[xvi]
Sadi v. Obama reflects that the government’s duty to U.S. employees and citizens abroad is at the discretion of the President and Secretary of State.[xvii] The requirement of the Department of State is simply to have an evacuation plan, and even then, the duty is placed once more on the President to do what is necessary and proper – like so many other duties the President has.[xviii] To reiterate, the government owes these responsibilities to Americans who pay income tax, vote in elections (legal citizens only), and, in the case of federal employees, work for the government.[xix] Aptly put, “claims demanding the evacuation of citizens and [Lawful Permanent Residents] from active war zones constitute political questions that are not subject to judicial resolution.”[xx] The inability to have a judicial resolution is, in part, the problem.
III. Patterns Across Time Show Need For Change
Members of the U.S. foreign service and diplomatic corps must put aside their own political beliefs to advance the President’s goals and, most importantly, the U.S.’s foreign policy goals. This is because the job itself is a collaboration across the political spectrum, with the common purpose of serving America; this issue is of a bipartisan nature.[xxi]
What happened in Kuwait is not the first time the government has faltered in fulfilling its duty to those working on behalf of the U.S. This is demonstrated above in Sadi v. Obama as well.[xxii] Another tragic example occurred in 2012 under President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton.[xxiii] The 2012 Benghazi attack was a direct attack on a U.S. Embassy Compound and CIA Annex, resulting in 4 deaths, including the “first violent death of a U.S. Ambassador since 1988.”[xxiv] Investigations followed and revealed the failure of Secretary of State Clinton’s ability to fulfil her duty to U.S. personnel, as the attack by the al-Qaeda-affiliated group was premeditated and thus, the “insufficient measures [were] responsible for the failure to prevent and respond properly to the attacks.”[xxv] The Benghazi attack illustrates the consequences that can follow when planning and responses are inadequate. Specifically, the U.S. mission to Libya repeatedly requested additional security following attacks and escalating threats against U.S. personnel, yet those requests were denied.[xxvi] These denials raised questions about whether Secretary Clinton fulfilled her statutory duty under 22 U.S.C. § 4802(b) to protect U.S. personnel abroad, particularly given the heightened risk they faced and the alleged failures of communication regarding security needs.[xxvii]
IV. Moving Forward
The State Department should establish clearer minimum standards governing advance communication, contingency planning, and departure procedures for diplomatic personnel and their families when foreseeable U.S. military action materially increases risks at a foreign post. Since evacuation decisions have, in practice, necessarily remained largely within Presidential discretion, the government should establish clearer and more consistent standards.[xxviii] Specifically, clear standards for advance planning and communication when foreseeable military action puts diplomatic posts at heightened risk.
Clearer and thus more consistent standards would allow for bipartisan goals to be reached, given that it would create specific standards to hold the President to. This would be an extension of the checks and balances the United States government is founded on and thus allow citizens, like those in Sabri, to hold their President accountable through the judicial branch.[xxix]
[i] See Al Jazeera Staff, US, Israel Launch Attack on Iran, Explosions in Israel, Arab States, Al Jazeera (Feb. 28, 2026), https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/2/28/explosions-in-downtown-tehran-smoke-seen-rising.; See also Al Jazeera Staff, Mapping US and Israeli Attacks on Iran and Tehran’s Retaliatory Strikes, Al Jazeera (Feb. 28, 2026), https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/2/28/mapping-us-and-israeli-attacks-on-iran-and-tehrans-retaliatory-strikes.; See also Federico Maccioni and Joanna Plucinska, US-Iran Strikes Unleash Travel Chaos as Airlines Cancel Flights, Reuters (Feb. 28, 2026), https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/airlines-suspend-middle-east-flights-after-us-israel-strikes-iran-2026-02-28/.; See also Lara Korte, Kuwait Says It Intercepted Missiles Aimed at Base Hosting US Forces, Stars & Stripes (Feb. 28, 2026), https://www.stripes.com/theaters/middle_east/2026-02-28/kuwait-air-base-attacked-20903985.html.
[ii] See Post Evacuations, U.S. Dep’t of State, https://www.state.gov/global-community-liaison-office/crisis-management/post-evacuations/ (last visited Oct. 22, 2026).
[iii] See Id.
[iv] Operation Epic Fury, U.S. Cent. Command, https://www.centcom.mil/OPERATIONS-AND-EXERCISES/EPIC-FURY/ (last visited Oct. 22, 2026).
[v] Emergency Action Plan, Nat’l Museum of American Diplomacy, https://diplomacy.state.gov/encyclopedia/emergency-action-plan/ (last visited Oct. 22, 2026).
[vi] Crisis Response and Evacuations, U.S. Dep’t of State (Aug. 11, 2025), https://travel.state.gov/en/international-travel/help-abroad/crisis-response.html.
[vii] 22 U.S.C. § 4802(b) (2024).
[viii] Exec. Order No. 12,656, § 1301(2)(f); 3 C.F.R. 585 (1988).
[ix] 22 U.S.C. § 1732 (2024).
[x] Sadi v. Obama, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73598, (E.D. Mich. June 8, 2015).
[xi] The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica, Yemeni Civil War, Encyclopedia Britannica (Jan. 18, 2024), https://www.britannica.com/event/Yemeni-Civil-War.
[xii] Sadi v. Obama, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73598, at 16 (E.D. Mich. June 8, 2015).
[xiii] Id., at 10.
[xiv] Id., at 13-14.
[xv] Id., at 14.
[xvi] Id., at 16.
[xvii] Sadi, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73598 (E.D. Mich. June 8, 2015).
[xviii] Zander Gosanko, What Does the U.S. Government Owe Its Citizens and Lawful Permanent Residents Abroad During Emergencies?, Colum. J. Transnat’l. (Oct. 4, 2021), https://www.jtl.columbia.edu/bulletin-blog/what-does-the-us-government-owe-its-citizens-and-lawful-permanent-residents-abroad-during-emergencies.
[xix] Id.
[xx] Id.
[xxi] See also Georgia Bernbaum, Foreign Policy – Our Last Hope for Bipartisanship, McCain Inst. (Aug. 9, 2024), https://www.mccaininstitute.org/resources/blog/last-hope-for-bipartisanship/.
[xxii] See Sadi, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73598, at 10 (E.D. Mich. June 8, 2015).
[xxiii] Madison Zeeman, The Benghazi Attack, Int’l Code of Conduct Ass’n, https://icoca.ch/case-studies/the-benghazi-attack/ (last visited Sept. 13, 2026).
[xxiv] Libya Revolt of 2011, Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/event/Libya-Revolt-of-2011 (last visited Sept. 13, 2026).
[xxv] Id.
[xxvi] See Id.
[xxvii] See Id.
[xxviii] Id.
[xxix] See Checks and Balances, Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/topic/checks-and-balances (last visited Oct. 22, 2026); See also Sadi v. Obama, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73598, at 10 (E.D. Mich. June 8, 2015).