DragonI

House Democrats Demand Information From White House About Security Clearances

After the revelation that President Trump had ordered that his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, be granted a top-secret clearance, two committees are now seeking documents and interviews with officials.

www.nytimes.com

The chairman, Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, who leads the House Oversight and Reform Committee, accused the White House in a new letter of stonewalling his requests for information and implied that if it did not comply voluntarily, he would issue a subpoena to compel its cooperation.

He said the report, published by The New York Times, added new concerns that Mr. Trump was lying to the public about his role in the clearance process to existing and broader questions about irregularities surrounding who should have access to sensitive government secrets.

“If true, these new reports raise grave questions about what derogatory information career officials obtained about Mr. Kushner to recommend denying him access to our nation’s most sensitive secrets,” Mr. Cummings wrote in a letter to Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel. 

The letter went on to ask about “why President Trump concealed his role in overruling that recommendation, why General Kelly and Mr. McGahn both felt compelled to document these actions, and why your office is continuing to withhold key documents and witnesses from this Committee.”

The Times also reported that Donald F. McGahn II, then the White House counsel, wrote a memo of his own documenting concerns raised by the C.I.A. and other officials about Mr. Kushner. 

The full scope of intelligence officials’ concerns about Mr. Kushner is not known. But the clearance had been held up in part over questions from the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. about his foreign and business contacts, including those related to Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Russia, according to multiple people familiar with the events.

The report of Trump's order, which the Times said was documented at the time by Kelly in a memo, contradicts statements the president made to the newspaper last month in which he claimed he had no role in the reinstatement of his son-in-law's security clearance.

“I was never involved with the security” clearances for Kushner, Trump was quoted as saying last month. “I know that there was issues back and forth about security for numerous people, actually. But I don’t want to get involved in that stuff.”

Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, said, “We don’t comment on security clearances.”

In an entry to Mr. Kushner’s personnel file on Sept. 15, 2017, the head of the personnel security division, Carl Kline, wrote, “Per conversation with WH Counsel the clearance was changed to interim Top Secret until we can confirm that the DOJ or someone else actually granted a final clearance. This action is out of an abundance of caution because the background investigation has not been completed.”

Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump both complained to the president about the situation, current and former administration officials said. In Mr. Kushner’s case, Mr. Trump would often turn to other aides and say in frustration, “Why isn’t this getting done?” according to a former administration official. On at least one occasion, the president asked another senior official if the person could sort out the issue. That official said no, according to this account.

A recent report by NBC revealed that Mr. Kline had overruled two career security specialists who had rejected Mr. Kushner’s application based on the F.B.I.’s concerns. A senior administration official confirmed the details laid out in the NBC report.

Mr. Kline was acting on the directive sent down by the president, one of the people familiar with the matter said.

Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump have had disclosure problems. Now we know that they both worked for months at the White House without full security clearances.

— Citizens for Ethics‏ @CREWcrew -  Feb 16, 2018