Jared got his back in May. Source: someone mentioned it on Twitter today, so it’s obviously true.
Jared also lost his access to the President’s Daily Brief, at some point in the past few weeks.
IIRC Jared’s clearance is hobbled by the fact he wasn’t give SCI access.
In case anyone doesn’t understand, it’s important to note that stripping these guys of clearance is totally pointless, and only supported by people who don’t understand how security clearance works.
Like, having clearance doesn’t mean you can actually get access to classified information, unless someone with clearance specifically chooses to share it with you. That’s why these guys generally keep their clearances, so that their replacements can consult with them.
It wasn’t like their clearance somehow earned them money or something. It doesn’t work like that. It’s not a status symbol.
Of course, Trump doesn’t understand any of this.
Basically once they’re no longer in their former position, they don’t have a general need to know.
It came off as incredibly petty and stupid.
Yeah, no one is making money off their clearance.
Since it would… you know… kind of be illegal for them to do so in most cases.
I guess some Congresscritters say, “I’ve seen the documents and I know this is a lie,” but they’re also seeing the documents because they’re on some Congressional oversight committee.
I mean at the end of the day he wants to do it cause they’re mean to him and give him the sads.
It’s one more norm to toss aside on the path to authoritarianism.
Keep in mind that Trump is also looking into putting them on Double Secret Probation, so there’s a bit more to it.
What it does do is make consulting with them, perhaps in a whistleblowing capacity, much more difficult.
Seems to me that everyone who has a clearance “monetizes” it. You can only use a clearance to access classified information that you have a valid “need to know”. The government decides who needs to know what (and why), so the only way to use a clearance is in service of a government job or contract. Those are all paid positions or contracted consultancies. If someone is monetizing a clearance by accessing classified information for a job, that is evidence that they need to keep the clearance.
As someone who had a security clearance at one time, I’m going to clear up a few things that aren’t correct, just for clarification on both Trump’s pettiness, but also his ulterior motive.
Mentioned up-thread, but getting a clearance takes quite some time and comes at a cost to the sponsoring military branch, agency, contractor, or company. There is a ton of background work that is done, lots of interviews, etc. So that being said, leaving where you are and going to another job that requires one saves them money. It can very much make you money for that very reason. Job listings frequently REQUIRE that for a lot of military contract work. You don’t make money by having it, but you can make money somewhere with a job that requires it. Those jobs that require it are called ‘cleared positions.’ That’s a nitpick, but it’s important because …
Antlers nails it. Taking one away means a loss of career opportunities IF (and this is most likely the case,) the new position requires it. For a lot of these folks, they have them and use them for consulting and work where dealing with confidential information is a necessity.
In time, most of them require PR’s (periodic re-investigation, anyway, and that timeline depends on how high the clearance was. For most of them it would be around 5 years total before a PR, as most of these names would probably fall under top secret or SCI. Thus they could parlay that into a short term gig somewhere making decent money while it is still active.
And that’s Trump’s game here. He’s being petty taking them away because it very much does screw over anyone who intended to use the fact that they had one to land a gig somewhere else. He and his team are also using this as a form of discrediting someone. The general population doesn’t understand clearances for the most part. Because of that, “stripped them of their clearance,” sounds a lot like showing that they cannot be trusted, aka are probably lying about anything and everything.
So it’s a chess move to play all of his detractors as liars, though that isn’t even close to the actual situation.
While you’re correct @skipper, I wonder how much a person like Brennan really needs his SCI clearance. Sure, not having one would limit access to some data but if you’re a spokesman or a policy maker for a company I think you could do a lot of the same work without having a clearance. Him losing a clearance doesn’t invalidate all of the experience he gained over the 30+ years he’s been doing this stuff (but to be honest it does make discussing things like that a big PITA).
The top guys like Brennan and Clapper maybe don’t need clearances for their continuing careers, but something like 2 million other people do (as I said, too many people have security clearances). This is Trump’s way of saying he can arbitrarily end any of their livelihoods if they speak out of line.
It’s hard to say. Examples might be things like, let’s say he lands a job with a security firm that specializes in cyber defense. He’s Ex-CIA, he knows a thing or two that he can’t probably share, but he would be able to talk to generalized threats, as well as classified data provided TO that firm to be used. And they might say, “we need you to speak about and present this classified data on cyber threats from us to the following US power providers so that we can sell them on using us for assistance.” To which Brennan might say, I can’t present that data, nor look at it anymore, I don’t have clearance.
I mean, there are a number of scenarios where he needs a clearance. There are less of those for say, top secret, and less still for SCI. But he’s Ex-CIA. those lesser needs would be his forte.
For most folks just the lost opportunities by having the clearance revoked would be immense. A lot of places look for you to already have a clearance when hiring.
For most people, absolutely (and I’m one of them so I do know how valuable a clearance is). But for these people whose names are being thrown around, I think we can all agree that Trump’s just being a dick.
Yes, I imagine they are all probably in the same boat as Hayden and don’t really care.
Mine lapsed without use but had I gone the military contractor route, it is a hefty addition to usually already very decent salary options. I’d certainly be pissed if mine was revoked for no other reason than pettiness.
I really do not know what these guys do now though. For all we know they are semi-retired and don’t give a damn because they don’t need them to be fill-ins on the MSNBC guest panels they speak on.
Ya, but these guys aren’t doing classified work any more… I mean, they aren’t that kind of dude.
Clapper, for instance, is gonna be making money in speaking engagements, based on the fact that he was DNI, not doing some kind of analyst work. Anyone who would have wanted his input would generally have been someone within the administration itself, so Trump basically just removed a potential resource for his own guys.