President-elect Donald Trump’s children could get top-secret clearances, according to a CBS News report on Tuesday, which was later refuted by Trump’s transition team.
Trump’s transition team asked the White House to look into the possibility of getting his children top secret clearances. If that were to happen, they would need designation by the current White House as national security advisers to their father to get security clearances. They'd have to fill out a form, SF-86, to go through background checks.
It’s illegal for the president to give his or her children work inside the White House—but they don’t need to be government officials to get top secret security clearances.
However, Trump’s transition group told Politico that the CBS report isn’t true. “That’s not something I’m expecting right now,” an unnamed official said.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) also downplayed the CBS report, saying that that type of security clearance isn’t that significant. “There’s a lot of people, by the way, in the country that have top-secret security clearance—basically anybody that does what I do in the military gets it,” Kinzinger was quoted as saying.
“It’s a level that you have to go through some intense background, but that’s different than what would be considered basically presidential-level security, and I’m not sure what that’s called or that classification. But basically you’re exposed to anything the president has, versus just top secret,” he said.
Trump’s kids, Ivanka, Eric, and Donald Jr., as well as son-in-law Jared Kushner—the husband of Ivanka—were named as part of the Trump transition team last week.
Ivanka, when asked on “60 Minutes,” said she wouldn’t join the Trump administration.
“I’m going to be a daughter. But I’ve said throughout the campaign that I am very passionate about certain issues. And that I want to fight for them,” she said on the Sunday night program.
