“”Anyone who signed that letter should be cut off from receiving any intelligence.””
I don’t understand WHY anyone not in an administration any longer still has security clearances. Is some idiot in the government saying that they are entitled to clearance and not being in the government any longer are of no DANGER to the country? Not subject to blackmail as much as any serving official? I wouldn’t trust any of those named. They already proved to the rest of us they couldn’t be trusted to be loyal to the country!
Others more knowledgeable can chime in but clearances are good for a certain period of time and in the context of the person’s responsibility. Just because you have TS clearance, doesn’t mean you can see TS material outside of your responsibilities.
“I don’t understand WHY anyone not in an administration any longer still has security clearances.”
I think people retain the clearance but lose any need to know once they become unemployed. A clearance might readily be reactivated for a few years after leaving a clearance-based job. I would probably have to undergo a new background check to get back the clearances I had 37 years ago.
If someone switches jobs, the new employer has to get the clearance reactivated I believe.
As I understand things, Trump would have had to request the Biden administration the reactivate his clearance. I don’t think Trump can see his still classified archive materials since Biden I understand didn’t reactivate Trump’s clearance after Trump left office.
Just because you have a clearance doesn’t mean you get to see classified material. You also have to have a ‘need to know’ the material in question.
I had a security clearance (TS/SSBI) when I was in the Navy as a Cryptologic Technician. I retained that clearance for 5 years, even after I got out of the Navy. However, I no longer had a need to know about any of it. If I got a civilian job, or reentered the navy, it would have been easier with a clearance already in place to reinvestigate and update than to start from scratch.