November 18, 2022 • 64 mins
How does a government decide who can know what? In the modern day, it comes down to something called security clearances. In today's episode the guys explore how the US decides who's trustworthy enough to get the scoop on stuff the public can't know -- and what happens when things go wrong. They don’t want you to read our book.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Nol and they
called me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer,
Mr Matt Frederick. Most importantly, you are you. You are here,
and that makes this the stuff they don't want you
to know. So this is a follow up episode, folks,
we did uh we previously looked at the absolute messy
(00:46):
Bollos spaghetti that is federal classification, How it got there,
why no one really wants to fix it now, just
because you know it's like legacy code. It's so precarious,
and I I cursed a lot in that episode, just
because you know it's uh in in saying how how
strange the situation is. That would be a fun experiment.
(01:09):
Give one person uh Ubert clearance to be able to
see everything right, and then they get to go through
everything that's ever ever been classified top secret down and
just like go through it and what is necessary and
what is not? Make do it? Maybe Jagger right he
probably got pretty close and used it, used it for
(01:30):
nefarious ends. Yes, Jagger Hoover was basically running the FBI
like a mob. That sounds like a monkey's park on
a scenario the two because like you'd find out so
much it would break your brain and then you would
just like you know, go postal in some very profound
and alarming way. Well, I mean, we could let Charlie
do it. Charlie Day would do it, or you know
(01:51):
what's Jared Kushner up to right now? Oh? Boy? Yeah,
that's a that's a billion dollar question, isn't it. Uh.
This follow up answers some of the questions that we
left off with. In federal Classification. We didn't get to
the part about security clearances. We talked about how things
(02:11):
are secret and why the concept of secrecy is so slippy.
We also learned a lot about Dagastani weddings, which was
apparently top secret or classified. Uh. But today we're gonna
look at how people actually get official access to this information.
So here are the facts. First thing, first, what what
(02:32):
is a security clearance like in real life? Well, here
in the United States, and security clearance is the official
um designation given to an individual UH in terms of
their level of access to varying types of classified information
within differing parts of the government. It allows them to
kind of, you know, it's silos information to different individuals
(02:56):
who qualify UH for these various security so it's very hierarchical.
In other words, access at one level UM gives you
access to the information at lower levels, but not you know,
the other way around. Yeah, so if you if you
get a secret clearance, then you odds are you're going
(03:17):
to have access to stuff that's less sensitive like classified
stuff as well. But if you just have a UM,
if you just have a number of clearances that are
like public trust clearance or just regular classified, then no,
you're not in the room where they talk about top
secret stuff. And the weirdest thing is, you know, a
lot of if you're going back to your idea the
(03:38):
one guy, the one guy or the one person, I
think what would surprise them the most be Yeah, there's
some horrific, frightening stuff, but a lot of it probably
doesn't matter to the average person, you know what I mean.
It's like, oh, we we have a line on you know,
the chocolate futures in insert company here. Most people aren't
(03:59):
gonna care, right, aren't going to be able to capitalize
on that, But they might come in handy for the
next coup though, just say yeah, yeah, the next the
chocolate coup. They'll call it, uh, this chocolate cous It
would be great. Yeah, it's chocolate coup already a thing
someone have that. I don't think so, I think it's
just chocolate range chocolate. Yeah, yeah, okay, no, chocolate coup
(04:23):
totally different. So so we have to remember, like, no,
you're correct. We have to also remember that secret clearance
for one agency or again fiefdom, does not necessarily mean
you have access to information other agencies consider secret. On paper,
they're supposed to the credit transfer of background check is
(04:45):
supposed to work, but that's not always the case, especially
when you get to the really sticky stuff. So how
do you get a security clearance? You have to be vetted.
There's a background investigation. Shout out to anybody who's had
one of those. They go pretty deep depending on your
level of clearance. Well, and you could think about this
too in maybe more of a workplace kind of situation.
(05:08):
Let's not connect to the government, like let's say somebody
works for a nuclear power plant, you know, it's that
you don't you don't have access to certain areas unless
you get clearance. And those clearances, because you're working with
potentially dangerous materials, do require significant background checks and regular
drug tests and all of that kind of stuff. So
(05:29):
there's there's some cross over there, but it's probably not
like something you've experienced unless you have had work in
one of those really dangerous, you know, situations right where
you're handling materials. The background checks I've had probably have
never gotten close to the level that you'd get if
you were going for a clearance, no question. I mean,
I think maybe all of us at some point had
to just get like a right to work background check,
(05:51):
you know, or had to present some sort of citizenship
documents or whatever just to satisfy certain legal criterias for corporations.
But it's probably about the extent of it for me. Man,
My understand is, you you need like this is like
talking to your friends and loved ones and like a
physical human being hanging out and going, hey, so what
do you know about this Noel Brown character? Right? You've
(06:14):
seen it in fiction, and it's actually not too far away.
In some cases, Uh, they might you might let's say,
I might get a call from someone who says, we're, uh,
we're evaluating nod friend of yours, Matthew Frederick, and uh,
just like to ask you some questions. We understand that
(06:34):
he played in a in a musical outfit called Lions
and Scissors. Is that correct to your knowledge? And they
were good. They not slap, I mean a little the fiction.
They're like, there's something interesting here because he's a co
writer on you know, track seven. Uh, and just like
(06:55):
to read these lyrics and get gone confirmed whether or
not he was involved ideologically with the message of this song.
Usually it's not. He was just but but they will
look into you know, your foreign contacts. They will, we'll
we'll get into all the stuff they'll look into. Uh.
And the drummer is the most important party. When people
say just the drummer, frontmen need to deal with that.
(07:18):
The drummer is the most important part. Oh, you frontmen
out there, stop front but your ego and check so
uh while all that's happening. And yes, the last you know,
maybe your college professors, maybe even down to your grade
school folks. Uh, they'll check every address you lived at
and if you spend time in another country, if you
(07:39):
have a dual passport, forget about it. Honestly, for some
of this stuff, you just you can't be trusted, even
if your record spotless. But you you also have to
sign really serious n d A s uh. This one
is called s F three one two because governments love
(08:01):
doing this. It's a standard form, but that's what s
F stands for. It applies to any employee of the
government or someone who contracts out, and a lot of
private citizens, a lot of civilians contractors do have clearances
they have to. But then it gets this other thing.
There has to be a proven reason that you need
to know this. You need to know about this Dagastani wedding,
(08:24):
you need to know about nuclear um nuclear enrichment technology.
So they have to say, here's why you do this.
Sometimes it's a formality. That might be the easiest part
because there's a lot of information that gets technically classified.
But if you're already in a secure network because of
your job, or you're going to a lot of meetings
(08:44):
because of your job, you're probably gonna hear about it,
you know what I mean. So sometimes the need to
know is we just feel like this person is naturally
going to run into this, So let's make it has
down to one off of these clearances. Uh. But then
(09:05):
you know, the stuff I think a lot of us
think of from the outside looking in is special access programs,
compartmentalized intelligence. This stuff did not happen kind of things,
black bag ops. You know, how do we get that
cocaine over the border into Los Angeles? That's that's that
(09:27):
didn't happen. Right officially, that's what the courts will tell you.
But I don't know, like how far how far should
you go for security clearance? Just the idea spooks some
people out, honestly. You know, they've got polygraphs sometimes even
though that's not solid science. Uh, in a lot of ways, right,
like how like you said, in all the deepest background check, Um,
(09:51):
they might have it at jobs like some n d A,
some basic prove you have a Social Security number in
the US birth certificate stuff. But it can go deeper
when you get a mortgage right or alone. Right, mortgages
are tough. They're like checking on your toe a nailing. Well,
not not to get too too personal, but like you know, recently, uh,
(10:13):
Matt and I both recently had to get a mortgage,
and um day before you know, my closing, all of
a sudden, there's this like five alarm kind of situation
where they're missing these uh details about my previous rental history.
And it's because I'm still renting the place and it
hasn't been exactly two years to the day, but it
(10:35):
will have been by the time my my lease is up.
And even though the lease says it's you know, for
this period through this period, the fact that I haven't
actually paid it doesn't match up to a payment that
I haven't made yet. So all of a sudden, they're like,
you gotta make the payment now, and I'm like, okay,
but I I do. I read through this property management
(10:57):
company and I don't even know how to go about
doing that comes out and it's like after hours on
the weekend, you know, and it was just, oh my god.
It was bonkers. And depending on the type of loan
you're getting to, you're going to have to do more
and more and more stringent kind of like submit yourself
to more stringent background checks and and very specific situations. Sorry,
(11:18):
I just just triggered me because that was like I
thought I was gonna lose it. And I literally thought
I was gonna lose my mind. No, we I get it.
I think we've all been through some kind of weird
situation like that, right, I really quickly, I want to
bring up Secret Service and I think we've talked about
this before quickly in the past been and I just
super fast. Um, I knew a guy who went into
(11:40):
UH to become a Secret Service agent and what he
had to go through to get that position and to
get cleared for that, Like the process was so nuts.
He had to prove that he has never ever once
smoked cannabis, Like he had to prove something that he's
never Yeah, because I guess they're worried about his potential
(12:02):
mind state because of that drug. Like that just that
that confused me to no end. Yeah, But I mean
that's an it's also an achronistic in archaic in some ways,
right that that law has not caught up with recent science,
That law is not caught up with other laws that
decriminalize or legalized cannabis in a federal level law to
(12:26):
that degree is probably on the way. But that's also
another reason why a lot of US cyber outfits are
in are having a tough time because it seems like
I'm quoting an anonymous source here. It seems like all
the good hackers get high and then like and that's
that's a deal breaker for a lot of clearances. So
(12:50):
they're gonna have to address that at some point. Um,
here's another thing. If you live in the US or
if you follow US politics, you've heard you've heard the
recent hubble ub uh. Security clearances and classification got in
the news in a big way not too long ago.
So we're gonna just clear the air here once and
for all. Yes, the President of the United States, the bodus,
(13:14):
whomever that may be, does have the ability to declassify
previously classified information. But it's not like just yelling base
in a game of tag. You have to do stuff.
There is a detailed process. You can't just you know,
snap your fingers and make it so well, he can't
do it with his mind. Man. Well, that was in
(13:36):
the news recently for President Donald Trump. I believe it
came out that he made a statement that he believed
he could just decide what to take by thinking about it. Yeah,
so that's and that's why all these arms of the
US government are freaking out now because make no mistake.
(13:59):
If you had that kind of there's not malevolence, let's
call it negligence. If you had that kind of negligence
as a government employee, you'd be fired. You you'd be
fired and sent to jail most likely with that. With that,
just because of the weight he's carried. Think of it
like drugs, right, information is like a drug. And he
(14:20):
was moving weight. Uh, and he was moving weight the
wrong way. So yes, However, a president does have the ability,
through some pretty detailed processes, to declassify some previously classified stuff.
So why won't they tell us about the aliens? Moving on?
Moving on? Man, I could take all the classified documents
(14:40):
I want and Adidas can't drop me right the scope,
I have a sneaker deal. I wonder what kind of
sneakers they would be. And he's got a big red
tie deal. Um over long, I thought it was the
same tie. But yes, no, no, it's it's true. U. Still,
(15:01):
the thing is that if they can't declassify it without
going through this process, if you are the president, you
do get some loopholes. You can get access to any
of the information you request, like a lot of it. Uh,
even if you would ordinarily not be able to get
a security clearance if you weren't president. So if you're
a president who says, yeah, I smoked weed and I inhaled,
(15:25):
like former President Barack Obama, you know that knocks you
out of the running for so like he couldn't be
on his own secret Service detail. But because he's the president,
you know, you circumvent that. So that's right, because you're
a duly elected president, all of that stuff goes by
the wayside, correct, Like you just have carte blotch. You
(15:46):
have access to all the things, a lot of them.
There's also the ideal plausible deniability because there's some stuff
you have to even if you have the vibe, you
have to not know about it. Uh, in case I'm
gonna start sniffing around or you get caught out. I
would imagine they would recommend that you not look at this.
But couldn't you also just say, na, screw that, show
(16:08):
me the goods you quite plausibly? Yeah, And you know
it's still the weird thing is it feels like there's
a lot of precedent there, But we have to remember
there haven't been a lot of US presidents. It's a
young country, so there's always there. There may well be
a plot twist on the way. And you know, but
until relatively recently, we seem to have had a tradition
(16:33):
of kind of following the rules and and and and
adhering to these kind of recommended uh standardizations. Right, yeah,
well people try. You know, the US is still in
the experiment phase as a country. Uh. Look, we know
that just like classification, a bunch of agencies can make
(16:53):
something secret or top secret, a bunch of agencies can
also clear people two do their stuff right to be
read on read into these programs. Right now, I think
the d D issues the majority of all clearances. If
you take all of their employees because they're huge, the Pentagons,
like the world world's biggest office building, and then you
(17:16):
take all the people who contract out, then about that
is going to be the D O T. But you know,
D O, E, C, I, A, all the all the
alphabet soup guys, they all have clearances and they're generally
something just hit, yeah, something just hit uh ben FBI
C I A A T F K K K K
(17:39):
K R S C and C B S wait I
R S NBC T N T. I was just I
was thinking up FBI, A, T F KKK I R, S, NBC, CBS,
T N T telling LIZE. Yeah, okay, okay, sorry, shout
(18:02):
out dead press. Yeah, that's that's the third verse and
a dead press. It's just that chance. It's pretty pretty sick.
Um dead press would not get security clearances. They say,
this is a big fan of him one and stick Man.
Uh No, they would not get clearances. Um, but if
you are a person gets clearances, they're like five types
(18:22):
you can get and they're they're a little bit snoozy
until you get to the end, but it's important to
know them. Let's hit you with it. Controlled unclassified. We
talked about that in the last episode, hopping over to
episode one in this series to learn about that one.
We got a public trust position. Now that's interesting, that's
(18:44):
that's I don't understand that one. Yeah, it's a weird one.
And so so like you are, you are not getting
a security clearance. It's not the same as being read
onto confidential stuff. But you're the nature of your job
whatever that might be, requires access to certain sensitive information,
(19:08):
so it can't be necessarily classified. But it is something
that could be weaponized. It's something that could be dangerous,
So you might you might be in a public trust
position if you work with certain levels of infrastructure or utilities. Right,
I know how I know how to hack the water
treatment facility, says someone work, right, so that I can
(19:33):
make it work? Well, WHOA what the guns out? So
we can make it work? Guys. So that's one that
I think is new to a lot of us. Those
can be considered moderate risk or high risk in the
U s pt P. That's another man. Okay, Next, you've
got confidential, that's you know, something we've all heard about.
(19:54):
That's like, that's like your low tier super controlled information. Right.
Then you got secret that's above that. Gotta you gotta
have another level to reach out one. Then top secret
and you know that's of course the one that's the
most exciting usually, but it's not really the most exciting
stuff is compartmented. Oh yeah, don't let don't let that
(20:19):
incredibly boring name fool you. It's not a bento box.
It's uh, the absolutely, it's not eligible, it's the absolute
top secret, creme de la creme of no one can know.
It's called sensitive compartmented information. And this is where all
the badgers, this is the bag where all the all
(20:41):
the interesting badgers are. You know, we're talking about signals
intelligence measures and signature intelligence mass and we're talking about
um the US Navy control systems, the Helm of Power here,
electronic surveillance programs like Stellar Wind, which was another thing
people were it's supposed to know about, and those have
(21:03):
the Really, here's a question I want to put to you, guys.
By the time you get to compartmented information access, aren't
you already pretty vetted? Like I would think, because this
is only case by case stuff. If you are read
onto some red into some aspect of Stellar Wind, then
(21:27):
you are not automatically read into any other hypothetical s
c I thing like you know, if they've been secretly
hunting Bigfoot or sixty years and there's a crack team
of neo Neanderthals who are participating in that search, you're
not going to know about it unless you get read
into that program. I was, Stellar Wind is a huge
(21:51):
surveillance thing. Everyone should be mad about it. Yeah that,
I mean that was was Stellar Wind before Snowdon or
was that a part of Snowden. That's the only thing
I can't remember because I know that's what I learned
about what Yes Nowdon talked about. I think Wired released
that when Wired and Washington Post in the Guardian, we're
able to do as this huge data mining operation very
(22:12):
illegal as in the wake of nine eleven that's when
it happened, and a lot of people who had top
secret security clearance wouldn't know about it, and a lot
of people who could have raised a flag in the
halls of government weren't told about it because you can
weaponize classification. There's an incredible whistle blower. I remember seeing
videos of him talking about this, and it's like I've
(22:34):
been trying to get tell people about this. William Binny
b I n n E. Yu say he was an
n s A agent who became a whistle blower and
talked about Stellar Wind and was not promoted afterwards. To
put it likely, so to get access to this, let's
take Benny as an example, he had to successfully go
(22:56):
through what's called a single scope background investigation. This is
the high level one they talk about. They check every
job you've ever had, whether you told them about it
or not. Education, any affiliations or organizations you've been kicking
it with, UH, any local law enforcement stuff, about every
(23:18):
place you have lived, worked, traveled, or attended school. Uh.
They'll also interview people who you personally and professionally. They'll
run your credit. Uh, they'll look if you've got a
spouse or someone who lives with you, whether that's a
roommate or a romantic partner. They're getting the business to
Everyone gets touched. And the reason everyone gets touched, as
(23:41):
paranoid as it sounds, is because in the era of
the Cold War, a lot of like deep cover folks
were able to successfully fool the system. So it's a
real thing. Even when it seems silly. Uh, it is dangerous.
And if at any point you refuse to us close
something or you accidentally don't disclose it, the rule is
(24:04):
you're automatically disqualified. That's the rule. So no scrups. You're
doing this cross word in pen and you can't get
an answer wrong. And in the end, it's like, how
how often do you still say the pledge of allegiance
to yourself in your mind? Because really it's what it's about,
right allegiance to the United States. If it's that, if
(24:25):
that's the government you're trying to get into. Yeah, so
let's think of it in terms of without getting too
in the weeds when you get to the crazy stuff, right,
So without getting too in the weeds, investigators are looking
for exactly the kind of stuff you would think about.
They want to see whether someone has lots of debt
that means they're easier to manipulate. Right, there's a financial motive.
(24:48):
They want to see if someone has a personal relationship
with sketchy characters. You know, how tight are you with
the ruling body of Saudi Arabia? Right, it's spent a
lot of time and you're in Yeah, okay, Sun be
a terrible example. Let's say mean mar or China would
be a spooky winner Russia something like that. Uh, if
(25:11):
you have a standing record, that's an interesting one of
immoral behavior, like moral turpitude. If you've ever heard that
phrase trying to pass customs. Uh. This can be sticky
and subjective because a lot of people say smoking wheat
in college or having an edible at a God Speed
to Black Emperor show when you're in your you know, twenties,
(25:35):
doesn't this is the best thing, the best of all
possible worlds, everything everywhere, all at once level cool. But
that would be regarded in some situations as immoral, you
might be able to mitigate it, but it'd be really tough.
Other things like d u I s. Of course, if
you have a bunch of if you've been busted with
a bunch of cocaine and you weren't working off the
(25:56):
books for an intelligence agency, and that's that's a problem. Um.
And one really messy thing about that one in particular
is you know, back in the day when the government
even more openly persecuted lgbt Q people, evidence of same
sex relationships or being being non heterosexual could also be
(26:23):
seen as even making you even more of a weak
link than having a lot of debt, because you might
be manipulated. That was how their their logic went. We're
not saying that. So that's what I mean when sticky,
it's subjective what is immoral? But also like the don't
people with families fall into that category? You know, if
(26:44):
you have loved ones or anyone that could be kidnapped
or threatened in order to get some information from you.
Isn't that sort of what we always see in like
action movies that just by you know, we we have
we have these like Lone Wolf characters have decided to
rid themselves off any attachment. It's because everyone they love,
they've ever loved, was hurt because of them. You know.
(27:05):
I just it seems like there are other ways outside
of this this moral turpitude kind of like path to
manipulate people. Yeah, there's always a way to get in.
There's a chink in every armor obviously, right. But uh,
but with the basically is how easy can we make
a p tape of this person? Right? Right? Right? Can
they get honey potted? So this, Uh, I've heard before,
(27:28):
and this is kind of off the record, but I've
heard before people saying that they like folks who have
an established family. They like you know, as long as
your family is also US based and you're children aren't
openly working as mercenaries, then uh, they like it because
(27:50):
it gives you, um, at least an appearance a higher
likelihood of stability. You have stuff on the line, you know. Um,
So it can it can go different ways, obviously, Yeah,
no criminal background, that's a big one. Uh. Sometimes people
get around it and then it goes the most subjective
thing that that you have mentioned, that sense of loyalty.
(28:14):
How do you prove that? How do you measure that flag?
Outside your house on a pole U flag on your
vehicle somewhere, either a sticker or like a lapel pit.
You have to own a bald eagle or no someone
for every meal pledge of allegiance before every meal, Um,
(28:37):
you have to have gone to the Stone Mountain laser
show at least twice. You remember that one? Oh yeah,
oh yeah, it's not been that long. I remember it was.
It's one of those things that seems normal when you're
a kid, and looking back, I'm like, wow, that's kind
of indoctrination, isn't it. Yeah, Stillmoult lasers show, folks, I
(28:59):
don't know if they still do it. Check it out.
So it's obvious white people have this right. Most people
who have security clearances aren't James Bond level wet work dudes.
They just need the info to do their job. You
are a janitorial staff at the Pentagon, then you probably
have a security clearance just because you probably don't have
(29:20):
You know, you're probably not read on two compartmented intelligence
or compartmentalized, but you are. They definitely looked into you.
Didn't just like give you the job on a handshaken
a vibe. Do you think instead of trash cans at
a secured facility like that. They have just paper shredders
everywhere instead like everybody has a paper shudder at their
(29:40):
desk or an incinerator. They actually have they have a
specific measure than they used to have, this specific measure
for the level of shredding, Like you couldn't have just
your you know, your office depo are best buy shredder
had to They didn't want people taping the strips together,
is what what they meant? Um, Yeah, that's a good question.
(30:03):
There was a rumor for a long time that you know,
there's a food court in the Pentagon or there was, Um,
it's probably still there. And for a long time I
had heard that even the folks were working at the
subway had to have a background check. And at that point,
I feel like I would think it was too much trouble,
you know what I mean, Like I'm and that's not
(30:25):
a ding on subway at all, But I would just
say I'm going through a lot. You know, this is
we're in an area in the world where they're like
twenty other subways down the street. Yeah. Can you imagine
just getting into work every day to have to do
prepped like to to make that tuna say, I which
you I bet that people were cool though you know
you're all you always gotta be nice in person. Makes
(30:47):
your food so right right now, It's so difficult to
guess how many people have a security clearance, but back
in the Washington Post put the number at about five
point one million. Again, how many people can know about
something before it no longer becomes secret. Five point one
million Americans some sort of security clearance for sense of
(31:09):
scale that is higher than the population of Norway. It's
like we told a group of people as big as
the population of Norway. Yeah, but that's why the compartment
and stuff is so much more interesting because there are
so many fewer people that have that kind of clearance.
Quick correction, So we checked these facts. I'm sorry, Matt, No,
(31:33):
I just remembered as of the population, Norway's five point
four zero eight million people, so they went up. Norwegians.
Please don't send the angry email. We checked. Uh, And
this is a lot of secrets. So the question is
what could go wrong? It turns out a great deal
(31:55):
and pause for word from our sponsors. Here's where it
gets crazy. Okay, No, Matt, how seriously how many people
can know something before we just throw up our heads
and say it's not a secret anymore. Those are what
(32:15):
they call open secrets, right, like Israel's nuclear program, right right, Yeah,
but I don't know it's it's is it more of
a is it more of an issue or a question
of decorum at that point, you know, where it's like, yeah, okay,
the cats out of the bag, But we don't want
to claim responsibility for letting the cat and or badgers
(32:36):
out of the bag. So we're gonna keep it classified
like that even though we know, because you know, it
behooves us for more people not to know. And if
something is an open secret, that also it still has
the air of around it. M hmm. Well, let's let's
talk about how weird these numbers are. So before the break,
(32:56):
we talked about five point one million Americans to have
some sort of security clearance. That number came from according
to the Washington Post. But this year CNN put out
an article written by Zachary B. Wolfe found that the
Director of National Intelligence twenty seventeen security clearance Determinations. Wow,
(33:18):
that's a lot listed more than two point eight million
people as having clearance as of that October, so like October. Um, yeah,
that's an interesting one. So are they talking about government
employees only, right, or the because that seems like a
heck of a drop from five million. Uh, you know
(33:41):
most of those again one point six have confidential or
secret information access and then one point to have the
top secret rating. But one point two million with top secret. Yeah,
a lot of secrets, a lot of a lot of
top secrets. But uh, but yeah, it's it's weird. There
are other people like said who have security clearance but
(34:02):
they don't currently have access to information. Private contractors clearances.
It's crazy they have to. And now in recent years
the idea of that, even the very important but often
snooze festi process of getting a security clearance has become
controversial politically charged. Uh. Two of the biggest issues, of course,
(34:24):
include when politics gets inserted into the into the clearance
game political impointees, I'm not saying this. It's not like
you know in the sixties, are you now or have
you ever been a member of the Communist Party. It's
like a bunch of people in in intelligence saying no,
(34:46):
not this guy, don't give it to him. And then
someone with a lot of political capital, using their juice
to say I don't care, you know what I mean.
And that's what happened with Trump and his son in law.
I see what you're saying. You're saying that like purity
clearances can kind of be rammed through with a little
grease from the right person. Yeah, and that's the problem
(35:08):
that they shouldn't I mean, yeah, right, yes, agreed, agreed,
I agreed. Yeah, I mean, let's let's talk about it. Then,
you guys, remember right with this wash the administration of
them President Trump, um, And we're using this one because
it's just the best, most recent example. And he gotten
a lot of hot water in the press and with
(35:30):
the intelligence community because he did two things that don't
make a lot of sense in a meritocracy or in
a competent security environment. One, he gave his son in
law a job right as like senior advisor. And this
was a political appointee position, which means it's really up
(35:50):
to hint, it's up to the president. It's the president's staff.
You can't say, I mean, you could say you don't
like someone, but that you don't have any influence on
whether or not they can get hired. Well, multiple high
level people did say that they they did. They did
because he not only hired Jared Koshner, his son in law,
but he gave him top secret clearance. Right. Yeah. Uh,
(36:14):
multiple agencies said back in like eighteen, they said, this
guy has a lot of conflicts of interest. Mr President. Uh,
we're just saying that if we were, if we were
doing the background check, she would check a lot of boxes.
That meant he could never work at this level. Bad
(36:34):
boxes bad But he had checking bad boxes. Yeah, because
I mean also, the question too becomes like why and
to what ends? Because you know, we're not and this
isn't what we do in the show. We're not trying
to smear anybody politically or anything. But there there there
was a sense I think among some you know, even
down to why did Trump take home those classified documents
(36:55):
and not give them up when asked that perhaps he
was priming uh, some of these close personal um confidants, uh,
to be able to access information and kind of hold
it over certain individuals. Yeah. And when you're dealing with
stuff that the Kushner family really was dealing with at
(37:15):
that time, you could you could be compromised in various ways.
One of the biggest ones been was this six million
dollar like real estate thing, Manhattan real estate deal American dream. Uh.
The Kushner family owned this pretty nice tower in Manhattan,
(37:37):
but they were hemorrhaging money on it. They were having
trouble with the deal. And again, to be fair, real
estate can be a risky business, right, So no one's
saying this was necessarily a scam, but it was seen
as a conflict of interest when it came out that
Uh Kushner and the Kushner companies were actively courting foreign
(38:00):
investors to help with the cash. That's something that is,
you know, not uncommon in the world of real estate,
but in the world of dealing with government secrets. You
don't want people who need money from foreign powers. It's
just like day one stuff. Yeah. And not only that,
they I think there was something about them they like
(38:21):
met with White House officials, the family did, and then
when they came away, I think the City Group and
maybe one other outfit like lent them a ton of
money after, you know. And and that's not necessarily that bit,
but it is kind of weird that they met with
White House officials to Greece some wheels there m h.
And then of course, Charlie dat and start drawing some
(38:44):
red strings between uh, that meeting and those loans Apollo
Global Management and City Group. Uh and and then just
connect the thoughts out to let's say, favorable financial policies
that might come up out you know, little stuff too,
maybe that the average person wouldn't notice because you don't
(39:05):
touch that rarefied air. Right. Uh So those are two
Those are two issues that people had, And the Washington
Post said that they had on record confirmed that foreign
officials were already having water cooler talk with themselves, going hey, okay,
so we got this guy over a barrel, how do
(39:26):
we leverage him? How can we turn this to our advantage?
You know, let's not say blackmail, but you know, how
do we how do we get to the kind of
a win win now that he's financially weak. That's exactly
what security clearance is supposed to figure out first. So
this doesn't even talk about Russia. We don't even we can't.
We don't have time to talk about Christian and Russia.
(39:49):
There's an episode for another day. I don't know, well
the big deal there. We can just say this, we
know that Kushner met with foreign officials with out letting
the groups know, they're supposed to know when someone at
that level is meeting with foreign officials, right, yeah, that's
the other thing. If you are meeting, so if you're
(40:11):
meeting as a representative of US policy, right, this is
not your college friend or whatever. You are meeting with
someone and you're saying, Hey, quid pro quo because I
can get some stuff done. I know just what you like.
You know what I like. I like favors to you
(40:33):
know what I mean, that kind of thing that's your
You are supposed to tell the National Security Council, like, hey,
I'm going out on the geopolitical town, might be out late,
might get in some trouble, don't wait up, uh, in
which case they would say, what the hell is wrong
with you? Right? Yeah, please please stay inside, Mr Koshner.
So how did he get a clearance? Then that's the question. Well,
(40:55):
I think you know, we've been tipping our hand a
little bit at that the present it in his in
his wisdom, or in in the power that the companies
that position was able to ram it through. He insisted.
He ordered it to be done, despite advisors, uh you know,
advising him to the contrary, and you know, it really
(41:17):
makes me think about you know, one of the first
things they teach you in like high school Civics class, uh,
for whatever reason, whether it's like to make you feel
better about this weird experiment called, you know, democracy that
we have is this idea of checks and balances. And
I know that's more about lawmaking, but at the end
of the day, when you have a president who is
(41:37):
gonna throw all tradition by the wayside, is going to
throw all kind of you know, pre established precedents and
and uh, decorum out the window, checks and balances kind
of go out the window too. I mean, you literally
have someone that is is able to order someone like
a king to to do a thing that everyone you
(41:58):
know who has more experience probably knows to be not
a good idea. That kind of absolute power is Uh,
here's a corrupting force, right and dangerous. That's how he
checks and balances are so important regardless of where uh
people might find themselves as individuals on the political spectrum. Right,
and the president over rides all these concerns. His White
(42:21):
House counsel says, don't do it. The White House Chief
of Staff is like, bro, don't do it, sleep it off,
you know what I mean, wake up and and and
have a look around. Uh In at the dawn of
a bright new day. And the day after, White House
Council Don McGann says, I'm going on record, you just
can't do it. There's too many conflicts of interest. Trump
(42:43):
does just what you described, nol Uh. Then President Trump
says this he forces it through this clearance, and that
meant that he ordered his son in law. Again, there's
a familial relationship to get access to top secret information
over the objections of prety much everybody who had actually
worked in this space. Not a good look. You know,
(43:06):
Like you're you Let's say you own the fire station
and you say, all right, I want my cousin Ernie
to be the chief firefighter. And they're like, oh, well,
has Ernie ever put out a fire or fontifier? It's like, well,
not so much put out, but he loves fire. He's
the man for the job. And they can't do anything
(43:30):
because you own the firehouse. It's not a perfect example
firehouse subs. Uh So this is this is problematic, you know,
And I guess if we're being fair, you have to say,
if he's let's leave the nepotism to one side. If
you are the senior advisor to the President of the
(43:50):
United States, it's it's functionally impossible to do that job
without a clearance, right, Like, I've never done it, But
I assume you run into a lot of classified stuff.
How are you going to advise the president on classified
stuff if you're not read in? Yeah, that's a good point.
Do you just go off vibes? Well, I can't really
make out most of this black highlighter, but Mr President,
(44:13):
I would recommend also remember how he said earlier that
someone accidentally leaves something out there. Clearance can be declined
or revoked. If they can prove you intentionally decided to
leave stuff out, you might be on the way to prison.
Pushner did that, or his legal team did, and his
team said the omissions weren't oversight. And here's their explanation.
(44:35):
This is true. This is on record. We can quote
chapter and verse from the Independent here by Rachel Revez,
his lawyer said, one of the staff members accidentally hit
the send button too early. That's what happened. Really, Oh man,
you guys ever had a moment like that where you
(44:55):
wish you could undersend something or you had an email
address one letter wrong, or you accidentally had an attachment
that wasn't right, or you know, a thread that contained
information that you shouldn't be sending to this person. I've
done with my phone multiple times, hitting you know, until
I go down the next thing and it just goes go, Well,
I had this weird auto tat feelings I'm getting yeah, yeah, yeah,
(45:19):
especially to pay on the email process. You're using your platform,
you're using because someone let you unsend things, or you
can get an extension that does it, and other ones
are like a gotcha. Here's the thing though, when even
I don't know how it works on every platform, but
on outlook, if you unsend something, which you can within
a certain period of time, it will still have a
(45:41):
remnant of like sober and so unsent an email tea,
It's like, what was that about? Man? You know, I
want to know what did you do? I've seen that.
But usually um, like if that happened between us, and
most of the folks who work with might just text
of them like what's it going on on? But but
(46:01):
in this situation, in this deep water, that feels like
a weird um narrative, right, not saying it's not true.
It just feels, especially people who are already distrustful of Kushner,
it feels like it's just even fishier, right, fishier than
an aquarium. This guy, they're saying. But at this point
we've got to say, we're kind of yeah, we're singing
(46:24):
amount because again, this is a great recent example of
how this stuff can go wrong. There's a whole laborntine
system meant to stop people with conflicts of interest from
getting through right to the beating heart of American secrecy.
But Pushner is not the only example. It's a matter
of fact, I say, maybe we pause for word from
(46:46):
our sponsors and zoom out a little and look at
the rest of the playing field. We're back, okay, we
we are kind of we were kind of dunking on
Jered Kushner. But uh, that's not the only problem. There's
(47:08):
been going on for more than a decade. There's a
lot of corruption in the system. It's like reading about this,
fellow listeners will make you wonder, what if you already
have a security clearance and just don't know. In two
thousand thirteen, UM the news organization Politico found that UH
found the following was gonna quote from because it's very
(47:29):
excellent reporting. Um quote. The process of conducting background checks
for national security clearances is riddled with extensive fraud that
can't be adequately combating, sort of like how history is
riddled with unexplained events. This h these this processes are
riddled with extensive fraud and can't be adequately combative. Yeah,
(47:52):
that's right, I think the again not picking on Trump here,
but that example is a perfect example of it of
not being able to do anything about it. So this
there was a lot of soul searching that happened after
these uh, incredibly sensitive leaks and whistleblowers. You know, like
Edward Snowden comes out now living in Russia, he got
(48:15):
a security clearance and it allowed him to leak all
this in food to the public. So people started investigating
their own clearance process and what they found was really frightening.
Is where we have to go to a guy named
Inspector General Patrick McFarlane and McFarland found that sixteen hundred
different background check reports were fabricated by guess what, one
(48:40):
employee who was herself hired on a faulty background check.
This is like that that one lab in lab Tech
who was doing all the U bad DNA test right, yeah,
or it reminds me of um. One of the morticians
are one of the people that were supposed to be
disposing of bodies in one way, but they were just
(49:01):
piling them up in the back because they didn't have
to spend any more money and they were making tons
of money Georgia. Yeah. Despicable. Despicable. So somebody was just going, uh,
fiddle d D. I'm sure that's fine. I spoke to
their employer and it was great. I didn't have time
(49:23):
to pull their financials, but I did make my quota
of X number of checks right over y period of time.
It might have been something like that. Uh. And the
weird thing is that employee who made up more than
background checks was herself hired on a screwed up background check.
The system is compromised. I'm telling you, Yeah, that's a problem.
(49:48):
That's a problem, you guys. I always I always think
about Edward Snowden and how like, you know, it's like
this guy got a background check to leak all this stuff,
But wasn't it more like he had a crisis of
conscience and he was like I gotta I gotta leak
this stuff. I thought that's how the thing went. I
imagine that that kind of thing could happen, and that's
(50:08):
way more dangerous. So, like, these background checks are meant
to prevent hiring someone who may at some point have
a crisis of conscience and want to leak information. Right
to have that lifelong loyalty, Right, even if you don't
always agree with everything your government does, you're going to
(50:31):
honor the agreement that you made right the charge you
took on. So these classifications, like a background investigation might
not be considered current. You get reinvestigated for the top
levels of stuff on a rotating basis, I think. But
mainly the idea is that you are meant to hold
(50:51):
those secrets for the rest of your waking days, right
even after you've gone through the debrief process, even after
you've been retired for twenty five years turned into a
weird robot somehow. Have you talked about the consequences for
for breaking one of these clearances? I mean, it varies,
I'm sure, and I know that's kind of what we're
talking about. You know, when you leak classified information, But
(51:15):
is there are there worst penalties associated with like breaking
that confidence when you've been obviously your clearance will be revoked.
But uh, is there like some sort of standard kind
of table of consequences that we can see. Yeah, well
they're not guaranteed to uh last forever, but you can
do stuff that will make your clearance automatically revoked. Right. Um,
(51:40):
and then if you and everybody is supposed to report
you like you're watching each other. Right, So there's there's
a lot of stuff that could be an accident to
you know, somebody's going home, right, they leave a facility
and they've got a briefcase with them, and they legitimately
just forgot that one of the things in that briefcase
(52:02):
was supposed to be under lock and key in a
secured area, right. Or you know, here's another one that's
a weird one. What if you're just you're on a
base somewhere, you're walking around. You see a piece of
paper just laying on the ground in the hallway. Human
error happens. Do you pick it up? Are you do
you have the classification to read it? Where where do
(52:24):
you take it? It's a it's like it's it's like
the emails I Heart sends us the fake phishing emails
that trying to trick out the emails. I don't think
people know about this. Our company all the time sends
us emails that are phishing attempts, but and they're meant
to resemble I heart official communications but be just a
(52:46):
little off. They're trying to train us to be able
to see phishing attempts. But it's they get us, they don't.
I don't know. I don't think they've gotten me yet,
but you never know, and then all of a sudden
you'll get another email that's like, did we get you
for it? I gotta say, though, UM, I have actually
avoided being scammed recently because of things that I learned
(53:10):
to look for because of those little got you uh
moments courtesy of our company. I was trying to sell
some stuff on Facebook Marketplace and there was this like
Zel scam that UM. I almost fell for it one time.
And what ultimately it led me to not fall for
it was remembering to look at the U R L
(53:30):
of the email that it was coming from. Uh. It
was payments Zel payments one five, six, seven three to
one at gmail dot com. Oh super legit. Yeah, So
I feel you, Matt and I've always felt a little
a little screwed with about those two, but it this
did kind of and then I and then it kept happening.
(53:51):
I was telling someone on Facebook marketplace, and then I
kept having like the same type of scams come up,
and I was just like, ha, got you. Well, uh,
you know that's that's good to hear that it has
had some use in uh, some impact, because otherwise it
just feels like such a weird flex to me. I
think I'm reading this email and I I would like
(54:12):
to say I never get caught. Um. There was one
that had me on a bit of a snipe hunt.
It was something about vacation time, and so I didn't
click on anything. I just went into the place where
I figure out vacation time and I my real response,
like my genuine response, was do I take vacations? When's
(54:33):
the last time I did? That? Is that you ever
logged a vacation day? Ever? Did this come from? Did
this come from the top angrily texting? But the moral
of the story is every floor paper you find out
the Pentagon is a trap. So do not pick the
world of the stories. Everything is a trap. Life is
one big escape room, a bar and our own We're
(54:57):
all the admiral act bars of our own story. This
of the party where no one gets out alive. Um
took it in a weird direction at the end, but
I like, I like what we're building. So they also
found this investigation. They also found that people who were
suspected of fraud couldn't get suspended. And it's so weird
(55:20):
because one individual got a job doing background checks for
a federal agency while they were facing appending criminal case
for falsifying background checks at another place. It's like, it's
like a big banker who's done some financial crimes gets
(55:41):
consulted on huge bailouts because they know the system the best.
You know, we need to do, guys, we need to
automate this thing with an algorithm and an AI and
it does all the human background checks. It's the only
way we're ever going to be able to trust a
background check again, is if a computer. Right, Well, we're
already this, you know. Honestly, that's my favorite. That's one
(56:01):
of my favorite background checks. Click on all the traffic lights,
click on all the stop sides. You know what I mean,
proof you're not a robot. I feel so validated when
that happens. I'm like, still got it. I love walking
on the leg and breathing with the lung, you know
what I mean, just the one. I'm being serious though,
(56:25):
I'm imagining a system that's like this human is not
fit to serve our government machine. Like, oh what what
we have obtained second hand cellular phone footage of Derek
Smith in college hitting a bong and commenting on the
colors of music. I mean, that's clo disqualified. Uh he
(56:51):
will not work at the Pentagon Subway. I don't know
if they still have this suthing. So then it has
to start manufacturing, you know, automatons to do the as
jobs and then to do the government jobs. It's going
to hit the balld. You talk about music both both.
Let's phase out the human part entirely. Let's just have
let's also have miscreant robots. Uh So, look, you can
(57:13):
see there are some problems with this. They go across administrations.
Part of it is due to the enormity and the
necessity of bureaucracy, right, And that's why this kind of
stuff is easy to not pay attention to. But there
are tons of people, literal tons of people who are
working in this field, and they're doing they're not really
(57:35):
doing it for the money. They're doing it because they're
good at it, and they're doing it because the security
of the country is important. This goes the same for
any other country, by the way, United Kingdom, China, you
name it. The systems are different, but they're ultimately designed
to do the same thing. Uh. And I was wondering
(57:57):
maybe we end on finally talking a little bit about
Q clearance. Not the awesome show by our pal Jake Hanrahan,
but shout out to you, Jake, Q clearance. That's what
the you know, the Q and on entity was like,
I don't know what's going on. I got Q clearance. Now,
Ben Minders saying is that Q clearance is just a
way to designate or a shorthand for top secret clearance.
(58:19):
Is that right or wrong? Yeah? Yeah, you're on base.
It's um it's the Department of Energy clearance that is
analogous the top secret clearance, got it, okay, Department of Energy. Yeah,
nuclear weapons. But they just wanted to be different, right. Uh.
This Q clearance is uh is something you've probably heard
(58:44):
of if you're if you have read about Q and
on at all, Um and you can get in the weeds.
You know, it's not a huge secret how it works
or what it is, because you know, it's got a
Wikipedia page. Check it out. But in pop culture and
the world of online colts, this thing attained legendary mythological status. Uh.
(59:05):
And it dates back to six A guy named Peter
Benchlet writes this novel called Q Clearance, and it's a
satirical novel. It's a comedy about how weird the government is. Uh.
And then of course we all know what happened. Then
that's when Q came along and started posting on four
Chan and eight chan and given all kinds of top
(59:27):
secrets about the storm because it was coming. Yeah, it
may it may have come and gone. We're not quite
sure it might still be coming. Um, although you know,
Q and on kind of coverage in the larger media
does seem to have waned a good bit. I imagine
that there are communities and pockets on the Internet that
are still pretty active in this stuff. Right, Oh yeah,
I bet you're right. I mean, so Q not Q Clearance,
(59:49):
but Q online claimed to have tremendous closeness with the
Trump administration and the inner circle of that administration. But
this was later proven probably to be false because a
lot of the so called predictions simply didn't come to
pass um and it became almost a surrealist game at
(01:00:11):
a time. You know, people were treating it as it
choose your own adventure version of conspiracy theory. And you know,
it was probably hilarious to the ninety two thousands something
people who have a real life QUE clearance. They're probably thinking,
I wish my job was that cool, you know, I
wish my job is that cue. But but this is
(01:00:33):
the problem. It's true, clearances are getting falsify. Uh, they're
being given out despite serious problems with the people who
are being cleared. And that spells danger for the United States.
Given that the United States is a powerful and dangerous country.
That spells danger for every person on earth. No hyperbole. So, uh,
what's to be done? I think we have to ask
(01:00:54):
our fellow listeners, Um, folks, let us can you solve it?
Can you solve it for us? Should just one person
be in charge of clearing everybody? That's it? Everything clear everyone?
Just one person gets in there, they know everything, they
clear everyone, then we all know all the secrets that
(01:01:17):
we'd all know too much, and then we'd all be
driving around and see, that's my thing. I've said it before,
I'll say it again. Secret secrets are no fun. Secret
secrets hurt someone. Um, we could if we could just
take that approach, you know, maybe we'd all be happier.
And I think it's just magically morph into a utopian
kind of situation. I'm not checking this so I I'm
(01:01:40):
just trying to figure it out off the top of
my head. If there are okay, we just take the
number of days in a year, right, we divide five
point one million by the number of days and year.
Then that person, if they didn't take vacations, would have
to clear four teen thousand, no, thirteen something thousand people
(01:02:02):
a day perfect he's done light work. Well, I mean
Meta is about to be you know, well, I don't
know Meta there. Maybe they'll be fine, but you know,
if something goes real wrong with Meta, we could just
put all their stuff, all their AI and all their
whatever they're working on. Just put it ton of companies
who want a piece of that pipe. Because the government
(01:02:24):
sustains the cost for these investigations regardless of how it
works out. And folks, we know it's a very high level. Look,
we are not active in that in that sphere, but
we are fascinating. We think that the average member of
the public should know more about this and about the
problems with the current system, so let us know how
(01:02:46):
it can be fixed. If you got any funny war
stories that you're comfortable sharing about background investigations and how
they did or did not go the way you thought,
we can't wait to hear it. We try to be
easy to find online. Correct. You can find this on Twitter.
You and find us on Facebook, and you can find
us on YouTube with a handle conspiracy stuff. We also
have a telephone number you can reach us at. Yes,
(01:03:06):
the number is one eight three three st d w
y t K. It's a voicemail system. You've got three minutes.
Give yourself a cool nickname so we know who you are,
but you're also anonymous. That's the that's the perfect way
to do it. We will give you the appropriate clearance
just by calling in, so you don't have to worry
about that, and uh say whatever you want. Just let
(01:03:28):
us know if we can use your voice and message
on the air. If you don't like talking on the phone,
why not instead type it all out in a good
old fashioned email. We are conspiracy at i heart radio
dot com st if they don't want you to know
(01:04:01):
is a production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts
from my heart Radio, visit the i heart radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Nol and they
called me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer,
Mr Matt Frederick. Most importantly, you are you. You are here,
and that makes this the stuff they don't want you
to know. So this is a follow up episode, folks,
we did uh we previously looked at the absolute messy
(00:46):
Bollos spaghetti that is federal classification, How it got there,
why no one really wants to fix it now, just
because you know it's like legacy code. It's so precarious,
and I I cursed a lot in that episode, just
because you know it's uh in in saying how how
strange the situation is. That would be a fun experiment.
(01:09):
Give one person uh Ubert clearance to be able to
see everything right, and then they get to go through
everything that's ever ever been classified top secret down and
just like go through it and what is necessary and
what is not? Make do it? Maybe Jagger right he
probably got pretty close and used it, used it for
(01:30):
nefarious ends. Yes, Jagger Hoover was basically running the FBI
like a mob. That sounds like a monkey's park on
a scenario the two because like you'd find out so
much it would break your brain and then you would
just like you know, go postal in some very profound
and alarming way. Well, I mean, we could let Charlie
do it. Charlie Day would do it, or you know
(01:51):
what's Jared Kushner up to right now? Oh? Boy? Yeah,
that's a that's a billion dollar question, isn't it. Uh.
This follow up answers some of the questions that we
left off with. In federal Classification. We didn't get to
the part about security clearances. We talked about how things
(02:11):
are secret and why the concept of secrecy is so slippy.
We also learned a lot about Dagastani weddings, which was
apparently top secret or classified. Uh. But today we're gonna
look at how people actually get official access to this information.
So here are the facts. First thing, first, what what
(02:32):
is a security clearance like in real life? Well, here
in the United States, and security clearance is the official
um designation given to an individual UH in terms of
their level of access to varying types of classified information
within differing parts of the government. It allows them to
kind of, you know, it's silos information to different individuals
(02:56):
who qualify UH for these various security so it's very hierarchical.
In other words, access at one level UM gives you
access to the information at lower levels, but not you know,
the other way around. Yeah, so if you if you
get a secret clearance, then you odds are you're going
(03:17):
to have access to stuff that's less sensitive like classified
stuff as well. But if you just have a UM,
if you just have a number of clearances that are
like public trust clearance or just regular classified, then no,
you're not in the room where they talk about top
secret stuff. And the weirdest thing is, you know, a
lot of if you're going back to your idea the
(03:38):
one guy, the one guy or the one person, I
think what would surprise them the most be Yeah, there's
some horrific, frightening stuff, but a lot of it probably
doesn't matter to the average person, you know what I mean.
It's like, oh, we we have a line on you know,
the chocolate futures in insert company here. Most people aren't
(03:59):
gonna care, right, aren't going to be able to capitalize
on that, But they might come in handy for the
next coup though, just say yeah, yeah, the next the
chocolate coup. They'll call it, uh, this chocolate cous It
would be great. Yeah, it's chocolate coup already a thing
someone have that. I don't think so, I think it's
just chocolate range chocolate. Yeah, yeah, okay, no, chocolate coup
(04:23):
totally different. So so we have to remember, like, no,
you're correct. We have to also remember that secret clearance
for one agency or again fiefdom, does not necessarily mean
you have access to information other agencies consider secret. On paper,
they're supposed to the credit transfer of background check is
(04:45):
supposed to work, but that's not always the case, especially
when you get to the really sticky stuff. So how
do you get a security clearance? You have to be vetted.
There's a background investigation. Shout out to anybody who's had
one of those. They go pretty deep depending on your
level of clearance. Well, and you could think about this
too in maybe more of a workplace kind of situation.
(05:08):
Let's not connect to the government, like let's say somebody
works for a nuclear power plant, you know, it's that
you don't you don't have access to certain areas unless
you get clearance. And those clearances, because you're working with
potentially dangerous materials, do require significant background checks and regular
drug tests and all of that kind of stuff. So
(05:29):
there's there's some cross over there, but it's probably not
like something you've experienced unless you have had work in
one of those really dangerous, you know, situations right where
you're handling materials. The background checks I've had probably have
never gotten close to the level that you'd get if
you were going for a clearance, no question. I mean,
I think maybe all of us at some point had
to just get like a right to work background check,
(05:51):
you know, or had to present some sort of citizenship
documents or whatever just to satisfy certain legal criterias for corporations.
But it's probably about the extent of it for me. Man,
My understand is, you you need like this is like
talking to your friends and loved ones and like a
physical human being hanging out and going, hey, so what
do you know about this Noel Brown character? Right? You've
(06:14):
seen it in fiction, and it's actually not too far away.
In some cases, Uh, they might you might let's say,
I might get a call from someone who says, we're, uh,
we're evaluating nod friend of yours, Matthew Frederick, and uh,
just like to ask you some questions. We understand that
(06:34):
he played in a in a musical outfit called Lions
and Scissors. Is that correct to your knowledge? And they
were good. They not slap, I mean a little the fiction.
They're like, there's something interesting here because he's a co
writer on you know, track seven. Uh, and just like
(06:55):
to read these lyrics and get gone confirmed whether or
not he was involved ideologically with the message of this song.
Usually it's not. He was just but but they will
look into you know, your foreign contacts. They will, we'll
we'll get into all the stuff they'll look into. Uh.
And the drummer is the most important party. When people
say just the drummer, frontmen need to deal with that.
(07:18):
The drummer is the most important part. Oh, you frontmen
out there, stop front but your ego and check so
uh while all that's happening. And yes, the last you know,
maybe your college professors, maybe even down to your grade
school folks. Uh, they'll check every address you lived at
and if you spend time in another country, if you
(07:39):
have a dual passport, forget about it. Honestly, for some
of this stuff, you just you can't be trusted, even
if your record spotless. But you you also have to
sign really serious n d A s uh. This one
is called s F three one two because governments love
(08:01):
doing this. It's a standard form, but that's what s
F stands for. It applies to any employee of the
government or someone who contracts out, and a lot of
private citizens, a lot of civilians contractors do have clearances
they have to. But then it gets this other thing.
There has to be a proven reason that you need
to know this. You need to know about this Dagastani wedding,
(08:24):
you need to know about nuclear um nuclear enrichment technology.
So they have to say, here's why you do this.
Sometimes it's a formality. That might be the easiest part
because there's a lot of information that gets technically classified.
But if you're already in a secure network because of
your job, or you're going to a lot of meetings
(08:44):
because of your job, you're probably gonna hear about it,
you know what I mean. So sometimes the need to
know is we just feel like this person is naturally
going to run into this, So let's make it has
down to one off of these clearances. Uh. But then
(09:05):
you know, the stuff I think a lot of us
think of from the outside looking in is special access programs,
compartmentalized intelligence. This stuff did not happen kind of things,
black bag ops. You know, how do we get that
cocaine over the border into Los Angeles? That's that's that
(09:27):
didn't happen. Right officially, that's what the courts will tell you.
But I don't know, like how far how far should
you go for security clearance? Just the idea spooks some
people out, honestly. You know, they've got polygraphs sometimes even
though that's not solid science. Uh, in a lot of ways, right,
like how like you said, in all the deepest background check, Um,
(09:51):
they might have it at jobs like some n d A,
some basic prove you have a Social Security number in
the US birth certificate stuff. But it can go deeper
when you get a mortgage right or alone. Right, mortgages
are tough. They're like checking on your toe a nailing. Well,
not not to get too too personal, but like you know, recently, uh,
(10:13):
Matt and I both recently had to get a mortgage,
and um day before you know, my closing, all of
a sudden, there's this like five alarm kind of situation
where they're missing these uh details about my previous rental history.
And it's because I'm still renting the place and it
hasn't been exactly two years to the day, but it
(10:35):
will have been by the time my my lease is up.
And even though the lease says it's you know, for
this period through this period, the fact that I haven't
actually paid it doesn't match up to a payment that
I haven't made yet. So all of a sudden, they're like,
you gotta make the payment now, and I'm like, okay,
but I I do. I read through this property management
(10:57):
company and I don't even know how to go about
doing that comes out and it's like after hours on
the weekend, you know, and it was just, oh my god.
It was bonkers. And depending on the type of loan
you're getting to, you're going to have to do more
and more and more stringent kind of like submit yourself
to more stringent background checks and and very specific situations. Sorry,
(11:18):
I just just triggered me because that was like I
thought I was gonna lose it. And I literally thought
I was gonna lose my mind. No, we I get it.
I think we've all been through some kind of weird
situation like that, right, I really quickly, I want to
bring up Secret Service and I think we've talked about
this before quickly in the past been and I just
super fast. Um, I knew a guy who went into
(11:40):
UH to become a Secret Service agent and what he
had to go through to get that position and to
get cleared for that, Like the process was so nuts.
He had to prove that he has never ever once
smoked cannabis, Like he had to prove something that he's
never Yeah, because I guess they're worried about his potential
(12:02):
mind state because of that drug. Like that just that
that confused me to no end. Yeah, But I mean
that's an it's also an achronistic in archaic in some ways,
right that that law has not caught up with recent science,
That law is not caught up with other laws that
decriminalize or legalized cannabis in a federal level law to
(12:26):
that degree is probably on the way. But that's also
another reason why a lot of US cyber outfits are
in are having a tough time because it seems like
I'm quoting an anonymous source here. It seems like all
the good hackers get high and then like and that's
that's a deal breaker for a lot of clearances. So
(12:50):
they're gonna have to address that at some point. Um,
here's another thing. If you live in the US or
if you follow US politics, you've heard you've heard the
recent hubble ub uh. Security clearances and classification got in
the news in a big way not too long ago.
So we're gonna just clear the air here once and
for all. Yes, the President of the United States, the bodus,
(13:14):
whomever that may be, does have the ability to declassify
previously classified information. But it's not like just yelling base
in a game of tag. You have to do stuff.
There is a detailed process. You can't just you know,
snap your fingers and make it so well, he can't
do it with his mind. Man. Well, that was in
(13:36):
the news recently for President Donald Trump. I believe it
came out that he made a statement that he believed
he could just decide what to take by thinking about it. Yeah,
so that's and that's why all these arms of the
US government are freaking out now because make no mistake.
(13:59):
If you had that kind of there's not malevolence, let's
call it negligence. If you had that kind of negligence
as a government employee, you'd be fired. You you'd be
fired and sent to jail most likely with that. With that,
just because of the weight he's carried. Think of it
like drugs, right, information is like a drug. And he
(14:20):
was moving weight. Uh, and he was moving weight the
wrong way. So yes, However, a president does have the ability,
through some pretty detailed processes, to declassify some previously classified stuff.
So why won't they tell us about the aliens? Moving on?
Moving on? Man, I could take all the classified documents
(14:40):
I want and Adidas can't drop me right the scope,
I have a sneaker deal. I wonder what kind of
sneakers they would be. And he's got a big red
tie deal. Um over long, I thought it was the
same tie. But yes, no, no, it's it's true. U. Still,
(15:01):
the thing is that if they can't declassify it without
going through this process, if you are the president, you
do get some loopholes. You can get access to any
of the information you request, like a lot of it. Uh,
even if you would ordinarily not be able to get
a security clearance if you weren't president. So if you're
a president who says, yeah, I smoked weed and I inhaled,
(15:25):
like former President Barack Obama, you know that knocks you
out of the running for so like he couldn't be
on his own secret Service detail. But because he's the president,
you know, you circumvent that. So that's right, because you're
a duly elected president, all of that stuff goes by
the wayside, correct, Like you just have carte blotch. You
(15:46):
have access to all the things, a lot of them.
There's also the ideal plausible deniability because there's some stuff
you have to even if you have the vibe, you
have to not know about it. Uh, in case I'm
gonna start sniffing around or you get caught out. I
would imagine they would recommend that you not look at this.
But couldn't you also just say, na, screw that, show
(16:08):
me the goods you quite plausibly? Yeah, And you know
it's still the weird thing is it feels like there's
a lot of precedent there, But we have to remember
there haven't been a lot of US presidents. It's a
young country, so there's always there. There may well be
a plot twist on the way. And you know, but
until relatively recently, we seem to have had a tradition
(16:33):
of kind of following the rules and and and and
adhering to these kind of recommended uh standardizations. Right, yeah,
well people try. You know, the US is still in
the experiment phase as a country. Uh. Look, we know
that just like classification, a bunch of agencies can make
(16:53):
something secret or top secret, a bunch of agencies can
also clear people two do their stuff right to be
read on read into these programs. Right now, I think
the d D issues the majority of all clearances. If
you take all of their employees because they're huge, the Pentagons,
like the world world's biggest office building, and then you
(17:16):
take all the people who contract out, then about that
is going to be the D O T. But you know,
D O, E, C, I, A, all the all the
alphabet soup guys, they all have clearances and they're generally
something just hit, yeah, something just hit uh ben FBI
C I A A T F K K K K
(17:39):
K R S C and C B S wait I
R S NBC T N T. I was just I
was thinking up FBI, A, T F KKK I R, S, NBC, CBS,
T N T telling LIZE. Yeah, okay, okay, sorry, shout
(18:02):
out dead press. Yeah, that's that's the third verse and
a dead press. It's just that chance. It's pretty pretty sick.
Um dead press would not get security clearances. They say,
this is a big fan of him one and stick Man.
Uh No, they would not get clearances. Um, but if
you are a person gets clearances, they're like five types
(18:22):
you can get and they're they're a little bit snoozy
until you get to the end, but it's important to
know them. Let's hit you with it. Controlled unclassified. We
talked about that in the last episode, hopping over to
episode one in this series to learn about that one.
We got a public trust position. Now that's interesting, that's
(18:44):
that's I don't understand that one. Yeah, it's a weird one.
And so so like you are, you are not getting
a security clearance. It's not the same as being read
onto confidential stuff. But you're the nature of your job
whatever that might be, requires access to certain sensitive information,
(19:08):
so it can't be necessarily classified. But it is something
that could be weaponized. It's something that could be dangerous,
So you might you might be in a public trust
position if you work with certain levels of infrastructure or utilities. Right,
I know how I know how to hack the water
treatment facility, says someone work, right, so that I can
(19:33):
make it work? Well, WHOA what the guns out? So
we can make it work? Guys. So that's one that
I think is new to a lot of us. Those
can be considered moderate risk or high risk in the
U s pt P. That's another man. Okay, Next, you've
got confidential, that's you know, something we've all heard about.
(19:54):
That's like, that's like your low tier super controlled information. Right.
Then you got secret that's above that. Gotta you gotta
have another level to reach out one. Then top secret
and you know that's of course the one that's the
most exciting usually, but it's not really the most exciting
stuff is compartmented. Oh yeah, don't let don't let that
(20:19):
incredibly boring name fool you. It's not a bento box.
It's uh, the absolutely, it's not eligible, it's the absolute
top secret, creme de la creme of no one can know.
It's called sensitive compartmented information. And this is where all
the badgers, this is the bag where all the all
(20:41):
the interesting badgers are. You know, we're talking about signals
intelligence measures and signature intelligence mass and we're talking about
um the US Navy control systems, the Helm of Power here,
electronic surveillance programs like Stellar Wind, which was another thing
people were it's supposed to know about, and those have
(21:03):
the Really, here's a question I want to put to you, guys.
By the time you get to compartmented information access, aren't
you already pretty vetted? Like I would think, because this
is only case by case stuff. If you are read
onto some red into some aspect of Stellar Wind, then
(21:27):
you are not automatically read into any other hypothetical s
c I thing like you know, if they've been secretly
hunting Bigfoot or sixty years and there's a crack team
of neo Neanderthals who are participating in that search, you're
not going to know about it unless you get read
into that program. I was, Stellar Wind is a huge
(21:51):
surveillance thing. Everyone should be mad about it. Yeah that,
I mean that was was Stellar Wind before Snowdon or
was that a part of Snowden. That's the only thing
I can't remember because I know that's what I learned
about what Yes Nowdon talked about. I think Wired released
that when Wired and Washington Post in the Guardian, we're
able to do as this huge data mining operation very
(22:12):
illegal as in the wake of nine eleven that's when
it happened, and a lot of people who had top
secret security clearance wouldn't know about it, and a lot
of people who could have raised a flag in the
halls of government weren't told about it because you can
weaponize classification. There's an incredible whistle blower. I remember seeing
videos of him talking about this, and it's like I've
(22:34):
been trying to get tell people about this. William Binny
b I n n E. Yu say he was an
n s A agent who became a whistle blower and
talked about Stellar Wind and was not promoted afterwards. To
put it likely, so to get access to this, let's
take Benny as an example, he had to successfully go
(22:56):
through what's called a single scope background investigation. This is
the high level one they talk about. They check every
job you've ever had, whether you told them about it
or not. Education, any affiliations or organizations you've been kicking
it with, UH, any local law enforcement stuff, about every
(23:18):
place you have lived, worked, traveled, or attended school. Uh.
They'll also interview people who you personally and professionally. They'll
run your credit. Uh, they'll look if you've got a
spouse or someone who lives with you, whether that's a
roommate or a romantic partner. They're getting the business to
Everyone gets touched. And the reason everyone gets touched, as
(23:41):
paranoid as it sounds, is because in the era of
the Cold War, a lot of like deep cover folks
were able to successfully fool the system. So it's a
real thing. Even when it seems silly. Uh, it is dangerous.
And if at any point you refuse to us close
something or you accidentally don't disclose it, the rule is
(24:04):
you're automatically disqualified. That's the rule. So no scrups. You're
doing this cross word in pen and you can't get
an answer wrong. And in the end, it's like, how
how often do you still say the pledge of allegiance
to yourself in your mind? Because really it's what it's about,
right allegiance to the United States. If it's that, if
(24:25):
that's the government you're trying to get into. Yeah, so
let's think of it in terms of without getting too
in the weeds when you get to the crazy stuff, right,
So without getting too in the weeds, investigators are looking
for exactly the kind of stuff you would think about.
They want to see whether someone has lots of debt
that means they're easier to manipulate. Right, there's a financial motive.
(24:48):
They want to see if someone has a personal relationship
with sketchy characters. You know, how tight are you with
the ruling body of Saudi Arabia? Right, it's spent a
lot of time and you're in Yeah, okay, Sun be
a terrible example. Let's say mean mar or China would
be a spooky winner Russia something like that. Uh, if
(25:11):
you have a standing record, that's an interesting one of
immoral behavior, like moral turpitude. If you've ever heard that
phrase trying to pass customs. Uh. This can be sticky
and subjective because a lot of people say smoking wheat
in college or having an edible at a God Speed
to Black Emperor show when you're in your you know, twenties,
(25:35):
doesn't this is the best thing, the best of all
possible worlds, everything everywhere, all at once level cool. But
that would be regarded in some situations as immoral, you
might be able to mitigate it, but it'd be really tough.
Other things like d u I s. Of course, if
you have a bunch of if you've been busted with
a bunch of cocaine and you weren't working off the
(25:56):
books for an intelligence agency, and that's that's a problem. Um.
And one really messy thing about that one in particular
is you know, back in the day when the government
even more openly persecuted lgbt Q people, evidence of same
sex relationships or being being non heterosexual could also be
(26:23):
seen as even making you even more of a weak
link than having a lot of debt, because you might
be manipulated. That was how their their logic went. We're
not saying that. So that's what I mean when sticky,
it's subjective what is immoral? But also like the don't
people with families fall into that category? You know, if
(26:44):
you have loved ones or anyone that could be kidnapped
or threatened in order to get some information from you.
Isn't that sort of what we always see in like
action movies that just by you know, we we have
we have these like Lone Wolf characters have decided to
rid themselves off any attachment. It's because everyone they love,
they've ever loved, was hurt because of them. You know.
(27:05):
I just it seems like there are other ways outside
of this this moral turpitude kind of like path to
manipulate people. Yeah, there's always a way to get in.
There's a chink in every armor obviously, right. But uh,
but with the basically is how easy can we make
a p tape of this person? Right? Right? Right? Can
they get honey potted? So this, Uh, I've heard before,
(27:28):
and this is kind of off the record, but I've
heard before people saying that they like folks who have
an established family. They like you know, as long as
your family is also US based and you're children aren't
openly working as mercenaries, then uh, they like it because
(27:50):
it gives you, um, at least an appearance a higher
likelihood of stability. You have stuff on the line, you know. Um,
So it can it can go different ways, obviously, Yeah,
no criminal background, that's a big one. Uh. Sometimes people
get around it and then it goes the most subjective
thing that that you have mentioned, that sense of loyalty.
(28:14):
How do you prove that? How do you measure that flag?
Outside your house on a pole U flag on your
vehicle somewhere, either a sticker or like a lapel pit.
You have to own a bald eagle or no someone
for every meal pledge of allegiance before every meal, Um,
(28:37):
you have to have gone to the Stone Mountain laser
show at least twice. You remember that one? Oh yeah,
oh yeah, it's not been that long. I remember it was.
It's one of those things that seems normal when you're
a kid, and looking back, I'm like, wow, that's kind
of indoctrination, isn't it. Yeah, Stillmoult lasers show, folks, I
(28:59):
don't know if they still do it. Check it out.
So it's obvious white people have this right. Most people
who have security clearances aren't James Bond level wet work dudes.
They just need the info to do their job. You
are a janitorial staff at the Pentagon, then you probably
have a security clearance just because you probably don't have
(29:20):
You know, you're probably not read on two compartmented intelligence
or compartmentalized, but you are. They definitely looked into you.
Didn't just like give you the job on a handshaken
a vibe. Do you think instead of trash cans at
a secured facility like that. They have just paper shredders
everywhere instead like everybody has a paper shudder at their
(29:40):
desk or an incinerator. They actually have they have a
specific measure than they used to have, this specific measure
for the level of shredding, Like you couldn't have just
your you know, your office depo are best buy shredder
had to They didn't want people taping the strips together,
is what what they meant? Um, Yeah, that's a good question.
(30:03):
There was a rumor for a long time that you know,
there's a food court in the Pentagon or there was, Um,
it's probably still there. And for a long time I
had heard that even the folks were working at the
subway had to have a background check. And at that point,
I feel like I would think it was too much trouble,
you know what I mean, Like I'm and that's not
(30:25):
a ding on subway at all, But I would just
say I'm going through a lot. You know, this is
we're in an area in the world where they're like
twenty other subways down the street. Yeah. Can you imagine
just getting into work every day to have to do
prepped like to to make that tuna say, I which
you I bet that people were cool though you know
you're all you always gotta be nice in person. Makes
(30:47):
your food so right right now, It's so difficult to
guess how many people have a security clearance, but back
in the Washington Post put the number at about five
point one million. Again, how many people can know about
something before it no longer becomes secret. Five point one
million Americans some sort of security clearance for sense of
(31:09):
scale that is higher than the population of Norway. It's
like we told a group of people as big as
the population of Norway. Yeah, but that's why the compartment
and stuff is so much more interesting because there are
so many fewer people that have that kind of clearance.
Quick correction, So we checked these facts. I'm sorry, Matt, No,
(31:33):
I just remembered as of the population, Norway's five point
four zero eight million people, so they went up. Norwegians.
Please don't send the angry email. We checked. Uh, And
this is a lot of secrets. So the question is
what could go wrong? It turns out a great deal
(31:55):
and pause for word from our sponsors. Here's where it
gets crazy. Okay, No, Matt, how seriously how many people
can know something before we just throw up our heads
and say it's not a secret anymore. Those are what
(32:15):
they call open secrets, right, like Israel's nuclear program, right right, Yeah,
but I don't know it's it's is it more of
a is it more of an issue or a question
of decorum at that point, you know, where it's like, yeah, okay,
the cats out of the bag, But we don't want
to claim responsibility for letting the cat and or badgers
(32:36):
out of the bag. So we're gonna keep it classified
like that even though we know, because you know, it
behooves us for more people not to know. And if
something is an open secret, that also it still has
the air of around it. M hmm. Well, let's let's
talk about how weird these numbers are. So before the break,
(32:56):
we talked about five point one million Americans to have
some sort of security clearance. That number came from according
to the Washington Post. But this year CNN put out
an article written by Zachary B. Wolfe found that the
Director of National Intelligence twenty seventeen security clearance Determinations. Wow,
(33:18):
that's a lot listed more than two point eight million
people as having clearance as of that October, so like October. Um, yeah,
that's an interesting one. So are they talking about government
employees only, right, or the because that seems like a
heck of a drop from five million. Uh, you know
(33:41):
most of those again one point six have confidential or
secret information access and then one point to have the
top secret rating. But one point two million with top secret. Yeah,
a lot of secrets, a lot of a lot of
top secrets. But uh, but yeah, it's it's weird. There
are other people like said who have security clearance but
(34:02):
they don't currently have access to information. Private contractors clearances.
It's crazy they have to. And now in recent years
the idea of that, even the very important but often
snooze festi process of getting a security clearance has become
controversial politically charged. Uh. Two of the biggest issues, of course,
(34:24):
include when politics gets inserted into the into the clearance
game political impointees, I'm not saying this. It's not like
you know in the sixties, are you now or have
you ever been a member of the Communist Party. It's
like a bunch of people in in intelligence saying no,
(34:46):
not this guy, don't give it to him. And then
someone with a lot of political capital, using their juice
to say I don't care, you know what I mean.
And that's what happened with Trump and his son in law.
I see what you're saying. You're saying that like purity
clearances can kind of be rammed through with a little
grease from the right person. Yeah, and that's the problem
(35:08):
that they shouldn't I mean, yeah, right, yes, agreed, agreed,
I agreed. Yeah, I mean, let's let's talk about it. Then,
you guys, remember right with this wash the administration of
them President Trump, um, And we're using this one because
it's just the best, most recent example. And he gotten
a lot of hot water in the press and with
(35:30):
the intelligence community because he did two things that don't
make a lot of sense in a meritocracy or in
a competent security environment. One, he gave his son in
law a job right as like senior advisor. And this
was a political appointee position, which means it's really up
(35:50):
to hint, it's up to the president. It's the president's staff.
You can't say, I mean, you could say you don't
like someone, but that you don't have any influence on
whether or not they can get hired. Well, multiple high
level people did say that they they did. They did
because he not only hired Jared Koshner, his son in law,
but he gave him top secret clearance. Right. Yeah. Uh,
(36:14):
multiple agencies said back in like eighteen, they said, this
guy has a lot of conflicts of interest. Mr President. Uh,
we're just saying that if we were, if we were
doing the background check, she would check a lot of boxes.
That meant he could never work at this level. Bad
(36:34):
boxes bad But he had checking bad boxes. Yeah, because
I mean also, the question too becomes like why and
to what ends? Because you know, we're not and this
isn't what we do in the show. We're not trying
to smear anybody politically or anything. But there there there
was a sense I think among some you know, even
down to why did Trump take home those classified documents
(36:55):
and not give them up when asked that perhaps he
was priming uh, some of these close personal um confidants, uh,
to be able to access information and kind of hold
it over certain individuals. Yeah. And when you're dealing with
stuff that the Kushner family really was dealing with at
(37:15):
that time, you could you could be compromised in various ways.
One of the biggest ones been was this six million
dollar like real estate thing, Manhattan real estate deal American dream. Uh.
The Kushner family owned this pretty nice tower in Manhattan,
(37:37):
but they were hemorrhaging money on it. They were having
trouble with the deal. And again, to be fair, real
estate can be a risky business, right, So no one's
saying this was necessarily a scam, but it was seen
as a conflict of interest when it came out that
Uh Kushner and the Kushner companies were actively courting foreign
(38:00):
investors to help with the cash. That's something that is,
you know, not uncommon in the world of real estate,
but in the world of dealing with government secrets. You
don't want people who need money from foreign powers. It's
just like day one stuff. Yeah. And not only that,
they I think there was something about them they like
(38:21):
met with White House officials, the family did, and then
when they came away, I think the City Group and
maybe one other outfit like lent them a ton of
money after, you know. And and that's not necessarily that bit,
but it is kind of weird that they met with
White House officials to Greece some wheels there m h.
And then of course, Charlie dat and start drawing some
(38:44):
red strings between uh, that meeting and those loans Apollo
Global Management and City Group. Uh and and then just
connect the thoughts out to let's say, favorable financial policies
that might come up out you know, little stuff too,
maybe that the average person wouldn't notice because you don't
(39:05):
touch that rarefied air. Right. Uh So those are two
Those are two issues that people had, And the Washington
Post said that they had on record confirmed that foreign
officials were already having water cooler talk with themselves, going hey, okay,
so we got this guy over a barrel, how do
(39:26):
we leverage him? How can we turn this to our advantage?
You know, let's not say blackmail, but you know, how
do we how do we get to the kind of
a win win now that he's financially weak. That's exactly
what security clearance is supposed to figure out first. So
this doesn't even talk about Russia. We don't even we can't.
We don't have time to talk about Christian and Russia.
(39:49):
There's an episode for another day. I don't know, well
the big deal there. We can just say this, we
know that Kushner met with foreign officials with out letting
the groups know, they're supposed to know when someone at
that level is meeting with foreign officials, right, yeah, that's
the other thing. If you are meeting, so if you're
(40:11):
meeting as a representative of US policy, right, this is
not your college friend or whatever. You are meeting with
someone and you're saying, Hey, quid pro quo because I
can get some stuff done. I know just what you like.
You know what I like. I like favors to you
(40:33):
know what I mean, that kind of thing that's your
You are supposed to tell the National Security Council, like, hey,
I'm going out on the geopolitical town, might be out late,
might get in some trouble, don't wait up, uh, in
which case they would say, what the hell is wrong
with you? Right? Yeah, please please stay inside, Mr Koshner.
So how did he get a clearance? Then that's the question. Well,
(40:55):
I think you know, we've been tipping our hand a
little bit at that the present it in his in
his wisdom, or in in the power that the companies
that position was able to ram it through. He insisted.
He ordered it to be done, despite advisors, uh you know,
advising him to the contrary, and you know, it really
(41:17):
makes me think about you know, one of the first
things they teach you in like high school Civics class, uh,
for whatever reason, whether it's like to make you feel
better about this weird experiment called, you know, democracy that
we have is this idea of checks and balances. And
I know that's more about lawmaking, but at the end
of the day, when you have a president who is
(41:37):
gonna throw all tradition by the wayside, is going to
throw all kind of you know, pre established precedents and
and uh, decorum out the window, checks and balances kind
of go out the window too. I mean, you literally
have someone that is is able to order someone like
a king to to do a thing that everyone you
(41:58):
know who has more experience probably knows to be not
a good idea. That kind of absolute power is Uh,
here's a corrupting force, right and dangerous. That's how he
checks and balances are so important regardless of where uh
people might find themselves as individuals on the political spectrum. Right,
and the president over rides all these concerns. His White
(42:21):
House counsel says, don't do it. The White House Chief
of Staff is like, bro, don't do it, sleep it off,
you know what I mean, wake up and and and
have a look around. Uh In at the dawn of
a bright new day. And the day after, White House
Council Don McGann says, I'm going on record, you just
can't do it. There's too many conflicts of interest. Trump
(42:43):
does just what you described, nol Uh. Then President Trump
says this he forces it through this clearance, and that
meant that he ordered his son in law. Again, there's
a familial relationship to get access to top secret information
over the objections of prety much everybody who had actually
worked in this space. Not a good look. You know,
(43:06):
Like you're you Let's say you own the fire station
and you say, all right, I want my cousin Ernie
to be the chief firefighter. And they're like, oh, well,
has Ernie ever put out a fire or fontifier? It's like, well,
not so much put out, but he loves fire. He's
the man for the job. And they can't do anything
(43:30):
because you own the firehouse. It's not a perfect example
firehouse subs. Uh So this is this is problematic, you know,
And I guess if we're being fair, you have to say,
if he's let's leave the nepotism to one side. If
you are the senior advisor to the President of the
(43:50):
United States, it's it's functionally impossible to do that job
without a clearance, right, Like, I've never done it, But
I assume you run into a lot of classified stuff.
How are you going to advise the president on classified
stuff if you're not read in? Yeah, that's a good point.
Do you just go off vibes? Well, I can't really
make out most of this black highlighter, but Mr President,
(44:13):
I would recommend also remember how he said earlier that
someone accidentally leaves something out there. Clearance can be declined
or revoked. If they can prove you intentionally decided to
leave stuff out, you might be on the way to prison.
Pushner did that, or his legal team did, and his
team said the omissions weren't oversight. And here's their explanation.
(44:35):
This is true. This is on record. We can quote
chapter and verse from the Independent here by Rachel Revez,
his lawyer said, one of the staff members accidentally hit
the send button too early. That's what happened. Really, Oh man,
you guys ever had a moment like that where you
(44:55):
wish you could undersend something or you had an email
address one letter wrong, or you accidentally had an attachment
that wasn't right, or you know, a thread that contained
information that you shouldn't be sending to this person. I've
done with my phone multiple times, hitting you know, until
I go down the next thing and it just goes go, Well,
I had this weird auto tat feelings I'm getting yeah, yeah, yeah,
(45:19):
especially to pay on the email process. You're using your platform,
you're using because someone let you unsend things, or you
can get an extension that does it, and other ones
are like a gotcha. Here's the thing though, when even
I don't know how it works on every platform, but
on outlook, if you unsend something, which you can within
a certain period of time, it will still have a
(45:41):
remnant of like sober and so unsent an email tea,
It's like, what was that about? Man? You know, I
want to know what did you do? I've seen that.
But usually um, like if that happened between us, and
most of the folks who work with might just text
of them like what's it going on on? But but
(46:01):
in this situation, in this deep water, that feels like
a weird um narrative, right, not saying it's not true.
It just feels, especially people who are already distrustful of Kushner,
it feels like it's just even fishier, right, fishier than
an aquarium. This guy, they're saying. But at this point
we've got to say, we're kind of yeah, we're singing
(46:24):
amount because again, this is a great recent example of
how this stuff can go wrong. There's a whole laborntine
system meant to stop people with conflicts of interest from
getting through right to the beating heart of American secrecy.
But Pushner is not the only example. It's a matter
of fact, I say, maybe we pause for word from
(46:46):
our sponsors and zoom out a little and look at
the rest of the playing field. We're back, okay, we
we are kind of we were kind of dunking on
Jered Kushner. But uh, that's not the only problem. There's
(47:08):
been going on for more than a decade. There's a
lot of corruption in the system. It's like reading about this,
fellow listeners will make you wonder, what if you already
have a security clearance and just don't know. In two
thousand thirteen, UM the news organization Politico found that UH
found the following was gonna quote from because it's very
(47:29):
excellent reporting. Um quote. The process of conducting background checks
for national security clearances is riddled with extensive fraud that
can't be adequately combating, sort of like how history is
riddled with unexplained events. This h these this processes are
riddled with extensive fraud and can't be adequately combative. Yeah,
(47:52):
that's right, I think the again not picking on Trump here,
but that example is a perfect example of it of
not being able to do anything about it. So this
there was a lot of soul searching that happened after
these uh, incredibly sensitive leaks and whistleblowers. You know, like
Edward Snowden comes out now living in Russia, he got
(48:15):
a security clearance and it allowed him to leak all
this in food to the public. So people started investigating
their own clearance process and what they found was really frightening.
Is where we have to go to a guy named
Inspector General Patrick McFarlane and McFarland found that sixteen hundred
different background check reports were fabricated by guess what, one
(48:40):
employee who was herself hired on a faulty background check.
This is like that that one lab in lab Tech
who was doing all the U bad DNA test right, yeah,
or it reminds me of um. One of the morticians
are one of the people that were supposed to be
disposing of bodies in one way, but they were just
(49:01):
piling them up in the back because they didn't have
to spend any more money and they were making tons
of money Georgia. Yeah. Despicable. Despicable. So somebody was just going, uh,
fiddle d D. I'm sure that's fine. I spoke to
their employer and it was great. I didn't have time
(49:23):
to pull their financials, but I did make my quota
of X number of checks right over y period of time.
It might have been something like that. Uh. And the
weird thing is that employee who made up more than
background checks was herself hired on a screwed up background check.
The system is compromised. I'm telling you, Yeah, that's a problem.
(49:48):
That's a problem, you guys. I always I always think
about Edward Snowden and how like, you know, it's like
this guy got a background check to leak all this stuff,
But wasn't it more like he had a crisis of
conscience and he was like I gotta I gotta leak
this stuff. I thought that's how the thing went. I
imagine that that kind of thing could happen, and that's
(50:08):
way more dangerous. So, like, these background checks are meant
to prevent hiring someone who may at some point have
a crisis of conscience and want to leak information. Right
to have that lifelong loyalty, Right, even if you don't
always agree with everything your government does, you're going to
(50:31):
honor the agreement that you made right the charge you
took on. So these classifications, like a background investigation might
not be considered current. You get reinvestigated for the top
levels of stuff on a rotating basis, I think. But
mainly the idea is that you are meant to hold
(50:51):
those secrets for the rest of your waking days, right
even after you've gone through the debrief process, even after
you've been retired for twenty five years turned into a
weird robot somehow. Have you talked about the consequences for
for breaking one of these clearances? I mean, it varies,
I'm sure, and I know that's kind of what we're
talking about. You know, when you leak classified information, But
(51:15):
is there are there worst penalties associated with like breaking
that confidence when you've been obviously your clearance will be revoked.
But uh, is there like some sort of standard kind
of table of consequences that we can see. Yeah, well
they're not guaranteed to uh last forever, but you can
do stuff that will make your clearance automatically revoked. Right. Um,
(51:40):
and then if you and everybody is supposed to report
you like you're watching each other. Right, So there's there's
a lot of stuff that could be an accident to
you know, somebody's going home, right, they leave a facility
and they've got a briefcase with them, and they legitimately
just forgot that one of the things in that briefcase
(52:02):
was supposed to be under lock and key in a
secured area, right. Or you know, here's another one that's
a weird one. What if you're just you're on a
base somewhere, you're walking around. You see a piece of
paper just laying on the ground in the hallway. Human
error happens. Do you pick it up? Are you do
you have the classification to read it? Where where do
(52:24):
you take it? It's a it's like it's it's like
the emails I Heart sends us the fake phishing emails
that trying to trick out the emails. I don't think
people know about this. Our company all the time sends
us emails that are phishing attempts, but and they're meant
to resemble I heart official communications but be just a
(52:46):
little off. They're trying to train us to be able
to see phishing attempts. But it's they get us, they don't.
I don't know. I don't think they've gotten me yet,
but you never know, and then all of a sudden
you'll get another email that's like, did we get you
for it? I gotta say, though, UM, I have actually
avoided being scammed recently because of things that I learned
(53:10):
to look for because of those little got you uh
moments courtesy of our company. I was trying to sell
some stuff on Facebook Marketplace and there was this like
Zel scam that UM. I almost fell for it one time.
And what ultimately it led me to not fall for
it was remembering to look at the U R L
(53:30):
of the email that it was coming from. Uh. It
was payments Zel payments one five, six, seven three to
one at gmail dot com. Oh super legit. Yeah, So
I feel you, Matt and I've always felt a little
a little screwed with about those two, but it this
did kind of and then I and then it kept happening.
(53:51):
I was telling someone on Facebook marketplace, and then I
kept having like the same type of scams come up,
and I was just like, ha, got you. Well, uh,
you know that's that's good to hear that it has
had some use in uh, some impact, because otherwise it
just feels like such a weird flex to me. I
think I'm reading this email and I I would like
(54:12):
to say I never get caught. Um. There was one
that had me on a bit of a snipe hunt.
It was something about vacation time, and so I didn't
click on anything. I just went into the place where
I figure out vacation time and I my real response,
like my genuine response, was do I take vacations? When's
(54:33):
the last time I did? That? Is that you ever
logged a vacation day? Ever? Did this come from? Did
this come from the top angrily texting? But the moral
of the story is every floor paper you find out
the Pentagon is a trap. So do not pick the
world of the stories. Everything is a trap. Life is
one big escape room, a bar and our own We're
(54:57):
all the admiral act bars of our own story. This
of the party where no one gets out alive. Um
took it in a weird direction at the end, but
I like, I like what we're building. So they also
found this investigation. They also found that people who were
suspected of fraud couldn't get suspended. And it's so weird
(55:20):
because one individual got a job doing background checks for
a federal agency while they were facing appending criminal case
for falsifying background checks at another place. It's like, it's
like a big banker who's done some financial crimes gets
(55:41):
consulted on huge bailouts because they know the system the best.
You know, we need to do, guys, we need to
automate this thing with an algorithm and an AI and
it does all the human background checks. It's the only
way we're ever going to be able to trust a
background check again, is if a computer. Right, Well, we're
already this, you know. Honestly, that's my favorite. That's one
(56:01):
of my favorite background checks. Click on all the traffic lights,
click on all the stop sides. You know what I mean,
proof you're not a robot. I feel so validated when
that happens. I'm like, still got it. I love walking
on the leg and breathing with the lung, you know
what I mean, just the one. I'm being serious though,
(56:25):
I'm imagining a system that's like this human is not
fit to serve our government machine. Like, oh what what
we have obtained second hand cellular phone footage of Derek
Smith in college hitting a bong and commenting on the
colors of music. I mean, that's clo disqualified. Uh he
(56:51):
will not work at the Pentagon Subway. I don't know
if they still have this suthing. So then it has
to start manufacturing, you know, automatons to do the as
jobs and then to do the government jobs. It's going
to hit the balld. You talk about music both both.
Let's phase out the human part entirely. Let's just have
let's also have miscreant robots. Uh So, look, you can
(57:13):
see there are some problems with this. They go across administrations.
Part of it is due to the enormity and the
necessity of bureaucracy, right, And that's why this kind of
stuff is easy to not pay attention to. But there
are tons of people, literal tons of people who are
working in this field, and they're doing they're not really
(57:35):
doing it for the money. They're doing it because they're
good at it, and they're doing it because the security
of the country is important. This goes the same for
any other country, by the way, United Kingdom, China, you
name it. The systems are different, but they're ultimately designed
to do the same thing. Uh. And I was wondering
(57:57):
maybe we end on finally talking a little bit about
Q clearance. Not the awesome show by our pal Jake Hanrahan,
but shout out to you, Jake, Q clearance. That's what
the you know, the Q and on entity was like,
I don't know what's going on. I got Q clearance. Now,
Ben Minders saying is that Q clearance is just a
way to designate or a shorthand for top secret clearance.
(58:19):
Is that right or wrong? Yeah? Yeah, you're on base.
It's um it's the Department of Energy clearance that is
analogous the top secret clearance, got it, okay, Department of Energy. Yeah,
nuclear weapons. But they just wanted to be different, right. Uh.
This Q clearance is uh is something you've probably heard
(58:44):
of if you're if you have read about Q and
on at all, Um and you can get in the weeds.
You know, it's not a huge secret how it works
or what it is, because you know, it's got a
Wikipedia page. Check it out. But in pop culture and
the world of online colts, this thing attained legendary mythological status. Uh.
(59:05):
And it dates back to six A guy named Peter
Benchlet writes this novel called Q Clearance, and it's a
satirical novel. It's a comedy about how weird the government is. Uh.
And then of course we all know what happened. Then
that's when Q came along and started posting on four
Chan and eight chan and given all kinds of top
(59:27):
secrets about the storm because it was coming. Yeah, it
may it may have come and gone. We're not quite
sure it might still be coming. Um, although you know,
Q and on kind of coverage in the larger media
does seem to have waned a good bit. I imagine
that there are communities and pockets on the Internet that
are still pretty active in this stuff. Right, Oh yeah,
I bet you're right. I mean, so Q not Q Clearance,
(59:49):
but Q online claimed to have tremendous closeness with the
Trump administration and the inner circle of that administration. But
this was later proven probably to be false because a
lot of the so called predictions simply didn't come to
pass um and it became almost a surrealist game at
(01:00:11):
a time. You know, people were treating it as it
choose your own adventure version of conspiracy theory. And you know,
it was probably hilarious to the ninety two thousands something
people who have a real life QUE clearance. They're probably thinking,
I wish my job was that cool, you know, I
wish my job is that cue. But but this is
(01:00:33):
the problem. It's true, clearances are getting falsify. Uh, they're
being given out despite serious problems with the people who
are being cleared. And that spells danger for the United States.
Given that the United States is a powerful and dangerous country.
That spells danger for every person on earth. No hyperbole. So, uh,
what's to be done? I think we have to ask
(01:00:54):
our fellow listeners, Um, folks, let us can you solve it?
Can you solve it for us? Should just one person
be in charge of clearing everybody? That's it? Everything clear everyone?
Just one person gets in there, they know everything, they
clear everyone, then we all know all the secrets that
(01:01:17):
we'd all know too much, and then we'd all be
driving around and see, that's my thing. I've said it before,
I'll say it again. Secret secrets are no fun. Secret
secrets hurt someone. Um, we could if we could just
take that approach, you know, maybe we'd all be happier.
And I think it's just magically morph into a utopian
kind of situation. I'm not checking this so I I'm
(01:01:40):
just trying to figure it out off the top of
my head. If there are okay, we just take the
number of days in a year, right, we divide five
point one million by the number of days and year.
Then that person, if they didn't take vacations, would have
to clear four teen thousand, no, thirteen something thousand people
(01:02:02):
a day perfect he's done light work. Well, I mean
Meta is about to be you know, well, I don't
know Meta there. Maybe they'll be fine, but you know,
if something goes real wrong with Meta, we could just
put all their stuff, all their AI and all their
whatever they're working on. Just put it ton of companies
who want a piece of that pipe. Because the government
(01:02:24):
sustains the cost for these investigations regardless of how it
works out. And folks, we know it's a very high level. Look,
we are not active in that in that sphere, but
we are fascinating. We think that the average member of
the public should know more about this and about the
problems with the current system, so let us know how
(01:02:46):
it can be fixed. If you got any funny war
stories that you're comfortable sharing about background investigations and how
they did or did not go the way you thought,
we can't wait to hear it. We try to be
easy to find online. Correct. You can find this on Twitter.
You and find us on Facebook, and you can find
us on YouTube with a handle conspiracy stuff. We also
have a telephone number you can reach us at. Yes,
(01:03:06):
the number is one eight three three st d w
y t K. It's a voicemail system. You've got three minutes.
Give yourself a cool nickname so we know who you are,
but you're also anonymous. That's the that's the perfect way
to do it. We will give you the appropriate clearance
just by calling in, so you don't have to worry
about that, and uh say whatever you want. Just let
(01:03:28):
us know if we can use your voice and message
on the air. If you don't like talking on the phone,
why not instead type it all out in a good
old fashioned email. We are conspiracy at i heart radio
dot com st if they don't want you to know
(01:04:01):
is a production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts
from my heart Radio, visit the i heart radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
Hosts And Creators
Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
Show Links
RSSStoreAboutLive ShowsPopular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com