OT but I have a question:
When someone needs access to classified materials thet must file certain forms and have an extensive background search done. But what happens when that person is the president? Did trump have a background check done? I cannot imagine him passing one. Did he fill out the necessary forms? Again I cannot imagine that trump could ever (were he anyone else) get even the most basic security clearance.
Kushner has had all sorts of trouble getting his forms right. Others also have had problems but what about trump?
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Ideally the primary would expose any such thing. Ideally the Republican party should have cared about that. Ideally Rubio or Cruz or Bush would have been able to call him on the carpet for crimes, and make public accusations and calls for inquiry and law enforcement.
The ridiculousness of all of this, Chump would have done it if he had such dirt on them. He has been shameless about using courts and accusations of lying and wrongdoing while he himself holds the world records.
I know that doesnāt answer your question about giving him access. The government seemed absolutely obliged to give it to him, from the moment he was the R Nomā¦I remember there was talk about folks hiding documents and not telling him stuff because they knew he would blab it and couldnāt keep Top Secret secrets. But as far as investigating him, seems to have been the oppositeā¦they were forced to give him Secret Service, secret briefings, and once he was the prez-elect, all that machinery kicked into an even higher gear of giving him more access. I donāt recall a single mention about background checks.
I donāt know if it is part of the official machinery, that āafter a thorough FBI checkā etc. What is weird is the FBI was looking into him anyways, and felt absolutely hamstrung to do anything about what they were finding in an official capacity. Like, yes we did an FBI check and holy shit they found a ton of stuff but are not able to do anything āthis close to an electionā. How Fān backwards is that?
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The entire classification system derives from Presidential Executive Order. It is by his/her authority that stuff is classified in the first place. So, by definition, the president is exempt from all the process and safeguards applied to pretty much anybody else who needs access to classified information to do their job or perform their duties. Because having the president grant the president access makes no sense.
Edit to add: this does not extend to, say, a presidential candidate, AFAIK. Iām pretty sure that there have been provisions made, probably authorized by the presidentāor authorized delegatesāto share some amount of classified with R and D nominees just as a reasonable measure to assure continuity of government. That which we used to do routinely, assuming ānormalā candidates like we had before Trump, may not seem so smart now that weāve seen what can happen when the assumptions of ānormalā are all blown away.
How this applies to stuff like personal information, etc, (other protected information held by the federal government that is not classified) I cannot say.
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