Trump terminates program tracking mass abductions of Ukrainian children

The Trump administration has terminated a U.S.-funded initiative that documents alleged Russian war crimes, including a sensitive database detailing the mass deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, according to U.S. officials familiar with the directive and documents obtained by the Washington Post.

The move has barred the transmission of evidence to prosecutors pursuing multiple criminal cases, including the International Criminal Court’s landmark indictment of Russian President Vladimir Putin for what it has called the “unlawful transfer” of children from occupied areas of Ukraine, U.S. officials said.

Researchers and experts involved in the initiative, spearheaded by Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab, were informed last month that the State Department had quietly terminated their contract – one of thousands eliminated at the behest of Trump appointee Peter Marocco and the Department of Government Efficiency, the budget-slashing arm of tech billionaire Elon Musk.

At that time, the researchers lost access to a trove of information, including satellite imagery and biometric data tracking the identities and locations of as many as 35,000 children from Ukraine.

Most alarming to U.S. lawmakers briefed on the matter is the suspected deletion of the research lab’s database amid the scramble to comply with the administration’s termination notice – an action likely to set back efforts to find the missing children and hold to account those responsible for their abduction.

“We have reason to believe that the data from the repository has been permanently deleted,” a group of lawmakers led by Rep. Greg Landsman, D-Ohio, warned in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. “If true, this would have devastating consequences.”

“This vital resource cannot be lost,” says a copy of the letter, obtained by the Post.

Another fear, lawmakers say, is that if the database were relocated rather than deleted, its contents now may be compromised and the digital forensic evidence inadmissible in court.

A State Department spokesperson confirmed that funding for the initiative had been terminated, but refused to answer whether the data had been deleted or compromised, referring “any questions” to MITRE, the nongovernmental organization that manages the initiative’s database.

When contacted, MITRE also refused to answer questions about the database’s status, referring questions back to the “Dept. of State.” A Yale University spokesperson confirmed that funding for the database has been “discontinued” but would not say if the database remains intact.

Researchers who have spent years collecting and synthesizing data for the initiative, known as the Conflict Observatory, say the stakes are high.

“The Trump administration, through either its incompetence or its intent, has now cast doubt on the validity of three years and $26 million of taxpayer-funded war crimes evidence,” said a researcher on the project who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

There are implications also for President Donald Trump’s efforts to end the war in Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said any agreement to stop the fighting must include Russia’s return of missing Ukrainian children and accountability for those responsible for their abduction. Rubio also recently told reporters that the return of the children would be an important issue to “unravel.”

Trump and Putin on Tuesday held a call to discuss a ceasefire proposal and efforts to restore U.S.-Russia relations. Since returning to office, Trump has taken a critical view of Zelenskyy, calling him a “dictator” and accusing him of starting the conflict despite Russia’s role in initiating hostilities.

The Observatory, overseen by the State Department’s Bureau of Conflict Stabilization Operations, began researching alleged Russian war crimes in May 2022, months after the war began. Yale’s work with the Observatory produced 13 public reports on Russia’s actions during its invasion of Ukraine and contributed to six ICC indictments against Russia officials, including Putin.

Former secretary of state Antony Blinken hailed the Observatory as a critical resource to “capture and shine a light on open-source evidence of Russia-perpetrated war crimes and other atrocities being committed in Ukraine.”

In 2023, ICC judges issued an arrest warrant for Putin and the country’s commissioner for children’s rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, saying the two bore individual responsibility for the war crimes of “unlawful deportation” and “unlawful transfer” of children from occupied areas of Ukraine.

The move was largely symbolic since Russia, like the United States, does not accept the ICC’s jurisdiction. But the warrant has created difficulties for Putin traveling to countries that cooperate with the court. It also gave credence to Ukraine’s long-standing claims that Russia has carried out the removal of thousands of children from Ukrainian territory.

The forced relocation of Ukrainian children to Russia or deeper into Russian-controlled territory has become one of the most fraught issues over the past three years of the war. In 2022, Putin issued a decree making it quicker and easier for Russians to adopt Ukrainian children. Commissioner Lvova-Belova is among the Russians who have adopted a Ukrainian child since Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Russia has long insisted it is moving children out of frontline areas to protect them, often sending them to summer camps in occupied Crimea or coastal regions of Russia. Ukraine describes the process of moving children to Russia as an attempt to erase their Ukrainian identity and indoctrinate them with Russian ideologies.

The Observatory’s repository includes detailed dossiers, photos, names and other metadata related to children from Ukraine being adopted and fostered by Russia. Researchers believe the dossiers will be critical for returning the children.

The repository was in the process of being transferred to EUROPOL, a European Union law enforcement agency, to assist law enforcement agencies inside and outside Ukraine in the prosecution of crimes. But the Trump administration’s termination of the program last month blocked the data transfer before it could be completed.

“This data is absolutely crucial to Ukraine’s efforts to return their children home,” wrote the U.S. lawmakers, including Democratic Reps. Jamie Raskin (Maryland), James McGovern (Massachusetts), Nikema Williams (Georgia), Tom Suozzi (New York) and others.

The lawmakers said the Observatory provides an “essential service” that “does not require the transfer of weapons or cash to Ukraine.”

“We must, immediately, resume the work to help Ukraine bring these children home,” they said.

Even if the funding to the Observatory is restored, the integrity of its data repository remains in question.

In some cases, the Observatory found evidence that Ukrainian children were present in Russia from information on Russian websites. The data was meticulously collected so that it could be used as evidence even if the names of children and information was later deleted from the Russian websites.

“Capturing the version of a digital artifact’s metadata at the time it was deemed relevant to an alleged crime is the basis of being able to admit it in a court of law,” said the researcher.

During a listening session with State Department employees last month, Marocco, the official in charge of foreign assistance, cited the $13 million spent on the Yale-led initiative as an example of “waste,” according to notes taken by a meeting attendee and obtained by the Post.

Termination of the program, reported earlier by news outlets The i Paper and the New Republic, comes as the Trump administration seeks to improve relations with Moscow in the hopes of ending the war in Ukraine, which has killed and injured hundreds of thousands of people on both sides of the conflict and cost the United States billions of dollars in support for Kyiv.

To accelerate his bid for a ceasefire, Trump has dispatched his senior envoy, Steve Witkoff, to Russia multiple times and approved early stage talks with Russian officials in Saudi Arabia several weeks ago.

Trump’s Justice Department also recently decided to withdraw the United States from a multinational group designed to hold officials in Russia, Belarus, North Korea and Iran responsible for crimes in Ukraine, the New York Times reported.

While Trump’s supporters have backed his diplomatic push, his termination of the Observatory has disturbed some of his political allies, including conservative Christian organizations that have called for the administration to reverse its decision.

“The abduction of children strikes a nerve that I hope will help awaken more Americans to the horrors of the Russian invasion and occupation of parts of Ukraine,” Galen Carey, vice president of government relations at the National Association of Evangelicals, told the Post. “I hope, too, that the funding cutoff will be seen as a mistake and quickly corrected.”