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comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  1317 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Past Presidents can still get the top secret PDB (President's Daily Briefing)

Law and custom?

There was no law against running for president as many terms as you wanted until FDR won a third and fourth term. At that point, the custom of only running two terms was permanently enshrined into law.

Retired intelligence officials customarily retain their security clearances unless there are reasons for them not to. There is no law insisting on their right. As former presidents are often diplomatically handy to keep around, it makes sense to retain their security clearance. Much of the behind-the-scenes negotiations with North Korea were accomplished by Clinton and Clinton's officials well into Obama's second term, for example.

However, there's nothing that says they have to keep them. Trump yanked John Brennan's security clearance over a Twitter slapfight. Pretty sure that was just a straight-up executive order, no congressional oversight necessary. And considering how angry Brennan is most of the time, I doubt he would have let it stand if he had any recourse.

Should we ever make it out of this alive, I suspect that a lot of the customs we've banked on to keep our executive branch in order will become laws, much like we gained the 22nd Amendment shortly after FDR passed. One of The Week's columnists observed that so much of our governance is dictated by custom, not law, and that Trump's entire power is his utter disregard for custom. However, it would be the mildest break of custom, and no violation of law, to yank the security clearances of every single person associated with this administration the minute his successor's hand leaves the bible on Inauguration Day.





b_b  ·  1317 days ago  ·  link  ·  

If Dems win the Senate and the Presidency they will be passing a lot of laws very quickly. What they need is a commission on hucksterism and abuse of power so that they can craft laws that make it very difficult for anyone to do this ever again. I think where they'll run into problems is trying to legislate some independence at the Justice Dept. The Courts have basically said that every political appointee works for the president and can be fired at will, and that this is baked into the constitution. No matter how big a wave the Dems can pull off I just think the Big Sort has more or less made new constitutional amendments DOA for the time being. I think where they can have a big impact is in disclosure laws, nepotism laws, limiting executive fiat, and so on. And yes, Trump has shown that the president has the full authority to ban (or grant) any security clearance he pleases, and there's no other sane person in America who would give Kushner security clearance. Trump's own DoJ told Kush to fuck off until he intervened. Even if they didn't revoke Big Don's credentials, he would no longer have the right to declassify whatever he wants willy nilly as he can now. We're going to have a lot of spring cleaning in 2021, god willing.