Trump says he didn't know Porter didn't have a security clearance -- deadly news for Kelly!

It truly stretches credulity to accept the premise that Trump didn't know.   Balderdash!  I'm not buying it.  I think he just didn't want to stick his neck out to exempt Rob Porter (as he did for his son-in-law Jared, who also never passed security muster), deciding to let it ride, figuring no one would notice or, even if they did, there'd be no consequences for him just as there so far haven't been for anything else below board Trump has ever done.  Did he realize he was thus placing Kellly in harm's way?  Since when has concern for anyone else ever stopped him from doing anything at all he wanted to do?

That's my opinion and I'm sticking with it.

If you start with the proposition that we live in a dangerous world, it is mind boggling that such simple execution of security clearance could get by a chief of staff. Is it stupid or lazy?

I did background investigations as a contractor for military & Federal civil service for a year.    He would have had to at least fill out an SF-86 ... and on that he would have been required to disclose the restraining orders ... which, per protocol, would have prompted an interview with ex-spouses by the investigator.

(this is the same form which Don Jr, Kushner, and others had to keep going back & revising for failure to report foreign contacts within the past 5 years)

If you added up all of their histories of scandals, arrests, financial hanky panky, etc .... I'm guessing Congress and the White House would start looking more like a street gang than a government body.

While an interim clearance is not that unusual given the backlog of clearance investigations it seems the Trumpet Clan has a special talent for hiring folks that should be pumping out portable toilets somewhere and not involved in high level government matters. (Although pumping out portable toilets is a more honorable profession than politics.) Porter would probably not have received a permanent clearance but that would be dependent on the FBI.

gatorfan wrote:While an interim clearance is not that unusual ....

An SF-86 still has to be filled out for an interim clearance.

Or maybe they're just not bothering with any of it .... kind of like the economic sanctions on Russia passed by Congress & signed by the President last July that were supposed to be implemented last October. Everything is optional ... apparently.

EmeraldGhost wrote:

gatorfan wrote:While an interim clearance is not that unusual ....

An SF-86 still has to be filled out for an interim clearance.

Yes I know, I never said otherwise. I had to do one at one point because I needed a TS/SCI clearance in the military. What a pain!