NATIONAL DEFENSE MAGAZINE By Lachlan McKinion and Dan Meyer
“There is little instant gratification within the security clearance process. It is the applicant’s or current holder’s own filing with security that impacts with significance how fast processing takes.”
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“The persistent ebb and flow of security clearance processing times is understood first and foremost through a pretty blunt fact: it is the applicant’s or current holder’s own filing with security that impacts with significance how fast processing takes.
Remember, most security clearance applicants are cleared and do classified work. The critical question is: how fast? What role does the applicant play in the speed of processing?
Let’s face it, another factor impacting processing times is the appeal of federal employment positions. Evidence of this is more anecdotal than empirical, but many in the millennial and Gen Z cohorts value federal employment more than candidates 30 years ago. Getting a federal job is a competition; to get in, you have to win.
Within the security circle of trust, backlogs rise and fall based on the number of older, more complex cases and the ability to close them. Some of those — like “Guideline H, Drug Involvement and Substance Misuse” cases — will drag. Drug use is complex. The facts take longer to resolve. State THC decriminalization leads to complicated fact patterns that take time to parse. This is compared to issues regarding, say, “Guideline F, Financial Considerations.” With continuous evaluations, more data is available to pull from and collect in real time, which can speed up the time to resolve these cases tremendously.
The timing of a filing can also impact processing. File just after one or more public and painful security violations — such as the Edward Snowden case — and applicants will likely end up stuck in the backlog. These actions slowed security specialists down, and no one wants their “yes” on the file of the next leaker.
Despite recent technology enhancements in gathering information about the applicant or holder’s life — they are being watched — a set of eyeballs and fingertips still must review any derogatory information after it is pulled. And those eyes and ears do not move faster; there is no software upgrade to speed up the federal security specialist. Complex cases and info-tech integration issues will always be present, and so will a backlog of some length. The question really is: how to avoid the backlog, shifting that delay to impair a competitor for that federal job you want.
So, how to optimize?
Read the regulations Security Executive Agent Directives 3 and 4 before applying, and every year thereafter. Agency regulations can be poorly written or hard to find; the director of national intelligence, who is the president’s point person on whether one can work for or with the federal government, has put it all in two concise and well-written directives.
A federal worker may not be a spy, but if they are in the executive branch, the DNI determines the policy for their clearance.
Be careful about “wisdom” from friends and the internet — everyone’s advice is rooted in their own security experience, and your experience may not be their experience.
Communicate with security contacts by email and keep a record of communications.
Be precise and on time in submissions. Be ready to apply before applying. Be deliberate filling out the forms. Get advice and counsel from professionals.
Retain copies of all documentation received and sent to security.
If one decides to lie or omit on a security form or in an interview, that is a business — not a legal — decision, and one an applicant will have to protect for life. No case is sadder than the federal clearance holder — mid-30s or early 40s with a spouse and family — who has to take a polygraph with an adjudicated lie still haunting a Standard Form 86 filed decades before. That’s blood in the water for sharky polygraphers.
Do not conduct a whisper campaign in the office or around town attempting to speed up processing. Communicate through security and do so with counsel. Whisperers are gamers, and gamers are not trusted.
First-time applicants ought to be careful about applying to the CIA, FBI or National Reconnaissance Office. Those security offices have very long wait times for reasons specific to each institution.
First-time applicants ought to be very careful about applying for a clearance that requires a polygraph. The polygraph process is, in part, about determining your response to questions through a machine; it is also a review of how you interact with security. It is better to already be within the security system, listening to mentors and watching the process, and then sit for a polygraph.
Keep a roof over your head and bowls full on the table while security does what security will do. There is always another applicant — few are unique, for the most part.
Understand that parents, professors, teachers, coaches, co-workers and friends have probably done great harm by making applicants think they are the center of the world. Security does not think that way. The security needs of the U.S. government are at the center of the world in which they work. To get a cubicle or desk, security has to know that applicants understand that truth.
The adjudicative guidelines enumerated in Security Executive Agent Directive 4 are the federal workforce’s bushido. Understanding the code agreed to live by is an important first step in identifying liabilities and the concerns a profile brings to the security file. Bringing in wise women and men, mentors and counsel who can fill in understanding of the gaps is the next step. Do that and leave the backlog to competitors in the rearview mirror. “
Lachlan McKinion is associate counsel in Tully Rinckey PLLC’s Washington, D.C., office. Dan Meyer is a national security partner in Tully Rinckey PLLC’s Washington, D.C., office and vice chair of the National Security Lawyers Association. They can be reached at: info@tullylegal.com.
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