President-elect Donald Trump is looking into acquiring top secret security clearances for his adult children, according to a Monday report from CBS News.
Anonymous sources told CBS that his transition team has asked the White House to explore how this could be done. Once Trump becomes president, he will be able to put in the request to obtain top secret clearances for Ivanka, Eric and Donald Jr., who will need to fill out a security questionnaire and go through a set of background checks, CBS reported.
Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller told CNN that no official request has been made.
Given that Trump has said his eldest children will run the Trump Organization through a “blind trust” while he serves in the White House, providing them with access to the country’s most closely held national security information would raise serious possible conflicts of interest.
Last week, Ivanka, Eric and Donald Jr, as well as Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, were named to the President-elect’s transition team. They have maintained they will not take formal roles in their father’s administration, and a decades-old nepotism rule prohibit public officials from hiring or promoting relatives. Yet the central role Trump’s adult children has played in his
campaign and transition is already a striking break from precedent.
You can’t make up shit like this.
Hell NO.
With Trump’s rampant Twitter use, might as well grant Top Secret clearance to every human in proximity to a computer or smartphone.
You know, just so we can talk about national security stuff over Sunday dinner. It’s not like we’re going to put it in an email.
Like someone on Laurence O’Donnell’s show said last night, this is playing out like a sitcom where dear old dad is in and the kids get to come along, too.
ETA: At least that’s the perception that the PE (formerly HO) has. Remember, they also thought that the White House came fully staffed with West Wing Staff.