“they politicized, and in some cases monetized, their public service and security clearances.”
Thank god, the administration is finally taking a stand against government officials who use their positions for personal gain.
If only they could get that Orange guy next.
Petty revenge slaps by an impotent President who's getting scared at how close federal investigations are to overturning the rocks that all his dirty business is hidden under.
Dude threatened to revoke the security clearances of James Comey and Andrew McCabe. News flash, when he fired them their clearances were automatically terminated.
It's not about security, it's about trying to hurt people who make him look and feel bad. And what could Brennan have done to bother Trump?
https://twitter.com/JohnBrennan/status/1018885971104985093
oh.
...and not to mention excessive, inappropriate, and unprofessional politicizing of situations! Can you imagine?!?
To be fair the Left does that shit too, and both sides deserve cockslapped for it.
I'm surprised to see he still had a clearance. Revocation upon resignation is SOP without a sponsoring transfer adjudicator (ie a new job asking to keep it).
You're surprised to hear the former director of the CIA had clearance (of any kind) less than a term into the following administration's incumbency?
Maybe it sounds strange to you, but yes. Security clearances aren't status symbols, they're purely a control mechanism meant to be discontinued as soon as no longer operationally relevant, regardless of who held them. You could be a high-ranking officer trusted with a TS/SCI for 40 years, and on your last day of work you'd be debriefed, read out of any active compartments, and then your clearance would be terminated upon completion of the debrief.
I'm not saying this to justify what's clearly a petty, politically-motivated (if purely symbolic) act, it's just weird to me that this is a thing to begin with.
No? It's rather common for former directors/high level officials to maintain their clearance status so they can provide consulting and assistance to current administration officials when needed. This is just a partisan retaliation.
Republican Patriots
This is an oxymoron
The way I've heard it is that your clearance expires without renewal. So while you're retired, you still technically have it, but since you're no longer on a need to know basis, you accessing that information would still be illegal despite your clearance. Clearance doesn't mean you can just log into a computer and see all the governments dirty secrets. You got to have a reason to access it.
Admiral McRaven, the commander of the Osama bin Laden raid, has weighed in (worth a read. pretty short too)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/revoke-my-security-clearance-too-mr-president/2018/08/16/8b149b02-a178-11e8-93e3-24d1703d2a7a_story.html?utm_term=.ff7755062b7b
It gets better
https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/17/politics/trump-ohr-doj-security-clearance/index.html
Its like when a kid finds a cool new tool in photoshop, so they start going ham and shit all over the place with it.
I'm at least moderately concerned about these moves.
For one, this is a blatant attack on his political opposition through abuse of his political power and seems like an attempt to intimidate people working in the FBI/DOJ who would criticize him.
More substantially and more concerning, this seems to be part of his larger effort to discredit and diminish the Mueller investigation by providing ideological fodder for Republicans to latch on to ahead of the completion of the council's investigation and the ensuing political battle that will result. Fox and Republicans will absolutely latch on to this sort of thing as a means to dismiss Mueller and his office's findings. It's disgusting.
Revoking security clearances is Trump's charcoal filter.
https://files.facepunch.com/forum/upload/109738/a340d501-511f-4dd7-b6a1-00648fa50cf1/image.png
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