Group Policy Management Access is Denied

I spent all morning chasing an annoying error in Group Policy Management while trying to delete an old unused OU while logged in as Domain Admin: Group Policy Management Access is Denied

I thought I would share the remarkably simple solution here, because I spent all morning following erroneous posts on various sites. Everyone seemed to be pointing to delegation or AD replication or permissions – none of which were the case!

Ultimately, I was unable to delete the OU from Group Policy Management because it was protected in Active Directory Users and Computers (ADUC) where a property was set: Prevent this object from accidental deletion.

Here’s the fix:

1. Open ADUC
2. In ADUC, got to: View > Advanced Features
3. Choose the: Object tab
4. Uncheck: Protect Object from accidental deletion
5. Right-click on object and: Delete