Report: A year after the election, 100 White House staffers lacked permanent security clearances

The White House.
(Image credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Documents obtained by CNN show that as of November, more than 100 staffers in the Executive Office of the President were still operating on interim security clearances, including high-profile senior advisers Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner and former White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter.

People with full permanent clearances are supposed to be careful about the information they share with those operating on an interim basis, but as staff secretary, Porter saw a wide range of documents and ultimately decided what papers should go to President Trump's desk. It's not clear how many staffers have since been granted full clearances or if it was a backlog that caused the delay in approving clearances or the background checks.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.