The government accidentally issues interim security clearances to 'murderers' and 'rapists'


A massive backlog of government security clearance reviews has led to "murderers" and "rapists" being able to access potentially sensitive national secrets, The Associated Press reports. With a 700,000-person review pileup, even agencies like the Defense Department have "inadvertently issue[d] interim passes to criminals," AP writes.
More than 4.3 million people have government security clearance to some degree, with 3 million people at the "confidential" level and more than a million people with "top secret" access. In addition to federal employees, many with clearance are private contractors.
The pileup stems from the fact that there is no quick and thorough way to check someone's background. Additionally, the government broke off a contract with a company that helped it do investigations back in 2014 after a security breach. Now, in an effort simply to get things done, the government has been issuing interim clearances, but those too prove to be minefields.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
"I've got murderers who have access to classified information," said U.S. Defense Security Service director Dan Payne. "I have rapists. I have pedophiles. I have people involved in child porn. I have all these things at the interim clearance level and I'm pulling their clearances on a weekly basis."
The Defense Department is already exploring alternative ways to improve vetting its employees and contractors. A new system of "continuous evaluation" has led to 48 people losing their clearances, The Associated Press reports.
Vetting "is one of these processes that have been unchanged for decades," explained the Marine Corp's director of intelligence, Maj. Gen. Michael Groen. "It's screaming for a different way to do business." Read the full report here.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.
-
Qatar luxury jet gift clouds Trump trip to Mideast
speed read Qatar is said to be presenting Trump with a $400 million plane, which would be among the biggest foreign gifts ever received by the US government
-
Trump taps Fox News' Pirro for DC attorney post
speed read The president has named Fox News host Jeanine Pirro to be the top federal prosecutor for Washington, replacing acting US Attorney Ed Martin
-
Trump, UK's Starmer outline first post-tariff deal
speed read President Donald Trump and British Prime Minister Kier Starmer struck a 'historic' agreement to eliminate some of the former's imposed tariffs
-
Fed leaves rates unchanged as Powell warns on tariffs
speed read The Federal Reserve says the risks of higher inflation and unemployment are increasing under Trump's tariffs
-
Denmark to grill US envoy on Greenland spying report
speed read The Trump administration ramped up spying on Greenland, says reporting by The Wall Street Journal
-
Supreme Court allows transgender troop ban
speed read The US Supreme Court will let the Trump administration begin executing its ban on transgender military service members
-
Hollywood confounded by Trump's film tariff idea
speed read President Trump proposed a '100% tariff' on movies 'produced in foreign lands'
-
Trump offers migrants $1,000 to 'self-deport'
speed read The Department of Homeland Security says undocumented immigrants can leave the US in a more 'dignified way'