Crow, Warren Demand Answers on Dismantling of Civilian Protections by Defense Department

WASHINGTON — Congressman Jason Crow (D-CO), a former paratrooper and Army Ranger who serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and House Armed Services Committee, along with Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), pressed the U.S. Department of Defense for answers about why they are defunding and deprioritizing programs that protect civilians during armed conflict. This has jeopardized the safety of servicemembers and civilians and potentially violated federal law.

Their letter to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth follows a new report by the DoD Inspector General that the Trump Administration defunded congressionally-mandated programs that are meant to protect civilians in combat. It finds that under Hegseth’s leadership, DoD has put both servicemembers and civilians at risk and has potentially violated federal law. The letter also follows what could be one of the largest civilian casualty events in modern U.S. military history, the strike on an Iranian girls’ elementary school that killed at least 175 civilians, many of them children. Since then, additional U.S. military strikes targeted Iranian water treatment facilities, damaging civilian infrastructure.

Joining Crow and Warren on the letter were Senators Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Andy Kim (D-NJ), Patty Murray (D-WA), and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Congresswoman Sara Jacobs (D-CA). 

“The Trump administration’s military adventurism overseas, combined with its obvious disregard for civilians, do not make the American people or our service members safer. We, therefore, request clarification about the steps the Department is taking to address these deficiencies and to protect civilians in line with the Department’s strategic, legal, and moral obligations,” wrote the lawmakers. 

The DoD’s Inspector General report includes a review of DoD’s implementation of its Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Action Plan (CHMR-AP), which outlines what steps will be taken to prevent, mitigate, and respond to civilian harm. The report confirms that all of the objectives of the plan are “at risk” under Hegseth’s leadership. The report states that the Trump administration’s failure to implement the plan means that the administration may have violated federal law by defunding and blocking civilian protection efforts. The report also revealed that DoD failed to cooperate with the OIGs investigation, including by blocking investigators from observing meetings and withholding access to DoD’s implementation tracking tools. 

“These revelations make real the concerns that we have previously raised about your complete ‘disregard for the strategic, legal, and moral imperative to minimize civilian harm,’” the lawmakers said. “The Department’s failure to implement the CHMR-AP has profound consequences for civilians in conflict zones and makes service members’ jobs harder and riskier,” they continued. 

The lawmakers pressed Secretary Hegseth to explain DoD’s failure to implement civilian protection policies, account for changes in resourcing and staffing for civilian protection efforts, explain what DoD is doing to comply with federal law requiring civilian protection policies and institutions, and provide any analysis DoD has done on the impact of recent strikes on civilian infrastructure in Iran by July 19, 2026.

The full text of the letter can be viewed here.

Crow, Co-Chair of the Protection of Civilians in Conflict Caucus, previously led 120 House colleagues demanding answers on civilian deaths during the Trump Administration’s Operation Epic Fury. His time in Iraq and Afghanistan informs much of his work in Congress aimed at increasing civilian protection in combat. He helped pass legislation codifying the creation of the Civilian Protection Center of Excellence, and has passed major portions of his Protection of Civilians in Military Operations Act and Department of Defense Civilian Harm Transparency Act.

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