The Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday issued a bipartisan request to White House Counsel Don McGahn and FBI Director Chris Wray for more information on how the Trump administration is handling the process for requesting security clearances.
The letter from Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) comes after reports that some 100 White House staffers, including Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, were working on interim clearances as of November 2017.
“If true, this raises significant concerns that ineligible individuals, who hold positions of public trust, may have access to sensitive or classified information,” the letter reads.
The senators request information, by March 13, on the total number of those working on interim clearances, what sensitive or classified information they have access to, and the exact circumstances surrounding the clearance for fired White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter, among other topics.
The Porter debacle prompted renewed scrutiny of the current White House’s processes. Porter was permitted to operate under an interim clearance while the FBI probed well-documented allegations of domestic abuse by his two ex-wives. White House officials including McGahn and Chief of Staff John Kelly were reportedly both aware of the allegations against Porter, and that they were holding up his full clearance.
The situation raised concerns that Porter could have had access to classified information without a full security clearance, potentially endangering national security.
Kelly has since proposed denying or revoking top clearances for any aide whose background check has been pending since last June or earlier. President Trump said it was up to Kelly to decide if Kushner, who fits that description, would have his interim clearance waived or revoked.
The House Oversight Committee is separately conducting an investigation into how Porter managed to keep working under a clearance despite the abuse allegations.
Read the Judiciary Committee’s full letter below:
What process?
Kushner Company is seemingly always trolling for money from foreign banks and investors. Some of those banks and investors are on the intel community’s radar for a litany of reasons. Jared has access to that intel.
I’m sure such shenanigans went on all the time in the Obama administration. Republicans were just more discreet in expressing their discomfort with it.
If there was a legitimate “process”, Kushner wouldn’t be anywhere near the White House getting the PDBs.
This rule about the President being able to grant clearance to anyone of his choosing has to change. Because why stop with Kushner? Why not grant clearance to Lavrov? I know it seems exceedingly silly, but when it comes to Trump, the worst case scenario is always possible and it’s not as if Republicans would stop him.
The interesting thing about this is how nobody is willing to make a decision. There are three people who could decisively act regarding Jared: Trump, Kelly, and Jared himself (the latter only to resign, which is of course the only honorable action). Kelly made a show of acting by his “out by Friday” proclamation, but Friday having come and gone with the Jared problem still festering proves him impotent and emasculated. If they wanted cover, they could get McGahn to write a recommendation, which they would then be “reluctant” to act on, in order to prevent the “appearance of conflict.”
But no, of all the people in the White House, not a single one is able to give an up or down answer as to whether Jared deserves to have access to classified information or not.
Jared, Ivanka and 98 other grifters? Clean the house, Herr Kelly – clean up this mess. Oh, and come up with some explanation for those meddling Congress critters. You have until March 14th, 11:59 p.m.