FBI Director James Comey delivered a litany of damaging findings Monday from the bureau’s investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of personal email while serving as secretary of state. Not only did Clinton violate numerous security protocols, but many of the statements made by Clinton and her surrogates regarding her email have turned out to be untrue.
Nevertheless, Comey announced the FBI would not recommend filing criminal charges in the care, though he did allow that “consequences” may very well be appropriate in a different context. “To be clear, this is not to suggest that in similar circumstances, a person who engaged in this activity would face no consequences,” Comey said. “To the contrary, those individuals are often subject to security or administrative sanctions.”
Based on the FBI’s findings that Mrs. Clinton was “extremely careless” with “sensitive, highly classified information”, if the former secretary of state were to apply for security clearance today, would she qualify? The State Department won’t say.
When asked, State Department spokesperson John Kirby replied, “I’m not going to comment on the FBI’s findings or its recommendations. Nor am I going to engage in hypothetical speculation.”
Director Comey’s references to “consequences” and “security or administrative sanctions” likely refer to governmental guidelines on eligibility for access to classified information. The state department, where Clinton served, includes the guidelines on its website. Section K deals with concerns regarding handling protected information.
Notably, when addressing “conditions that could raise a security concern and may be disqualifying”, the guidelines stress that national security violations may be disqualifying “regardless of whether it was deliberate or negligent.” Comey’s statement said that “seven e-mail chains concern matters that were classified at the Top Secret/Special Access Program level when they were sent and received” and that “any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton’s position… should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation.”
Based on the FBI’s findings, a review of the conditions cited in Section K of the guidelines that may raise disqualifying security concerns reveal that Clinton violated more than half. Despite the violations, the state department declined to say whether or not the former secretary would now be able to pass a security screening.
In any case, if Hillary Clinton wins the election in November, she will receive daily briefings on the most sensitive and top secret national security matters as Commander-in-Chief, and no security clearance will be necessary.
The full text of Section K from the Adjudicative Guidelines for Determining Eligibility for Access to Classified Information from the State Department website is reproduced below:
