Two years ago, the FBI raided Donald Trump’s home to retrieve government records he had refused to return, including hundreds containing classified information. The indictment that followed alleged the former President had left classified information laying around next to a toilet and stacked on a ballroom stage.
Now Trump is poised to be briefed once again on the country’s secrets to prepare him to take the reins of government on Jan. 20. “They’re not going to restrict it,” says a Republican involved in the transition.
It’s an awkward dance. Biden previously called Trump’s handling of Top Secret documents “totally irresponsible.” And during his first term, Trump raised alarms in the intelligence community when he reportedly shared secrets of a close U.S. ally with senior Russian officials during an Oval Office meeting. In the interim, federal officials charged Trump with violating the Espionage Act for unauthorized retention of national defense information, a case that is now likely to be closed in the coming weeks.
But Biden has directed his entire Administration to work with Trump’s team to ensure an “orderly” transition. That means looking past Trump’s previous history with classified information.
“He was indicted for mishandling classified information,” says Jeremy Bash, a former chief of staff for the CIA and the Department of Defense during the Obama Administration. “But given that he is about to assume the Presidency, the responsible thing to do would be to provide him the classified briefings and offer government resources to help him handle and store any classified material he needs to hold on to.”
For decades, President-elects have been allowed to receive sensitive national security briefings by the country’s intelligence services well before Inauguration Day. It’s a practice rooted in the idea that the voters have chosen the person to run the country, and there is no further vetting required beyond they are sworn into office.
Asked on Thursday if Biden was concerned Trump may leak secrets, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said she is “not going to get into speculation” about what Trump may do with classified information he’s given, and she referred TIME’s question to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which will be responsible for reading Trump in on the country’s closely held operations.
“ODNI is acting consistent with the tradition, in place since 1952, of providing intelligence briefings to the President-elect,” said an ODNI spokesperson.
Gregory Treverton, who was the chair of the National Intelligence Council from 2014 to 2017, described as “scary” Trump’s history of seemingly showing off classified information to others as a souvenir, without regard for whom he may be endangering in the process. The situation will pose a major challenge for intelligence officials who work to hide the way they gathered information and protect sources who may have risked their lives, he says. “For a profession that is so disciplined and so nonpartisan and so careful about politics, to confront someone who trespasses on all those norms, is awful,” Treverton says.
Ahead of a presidential election, the Democratic and Republican nominees usually sign an agreement with the General Services Administration in the final months of the campaign to get briefings from key federal agencies. That’s meant to ensure the winning candidate can get a head start on hiring and preparing to tackle the country’s most thorny issues. But Trump’s team decided not to sign on to that agreement before Election Day, and are only now negotiating the terms under which his aides can use federal office space and look under the hood of the operations of the federal government.
“The Trump-Vance transition lawyers continue to constructively engage with the Biden-Harris Administration lawyers regarding all agreements contemplated by the Presidential Transition Act. We will update you once a decision is made,” said Brian Hughes, Trump-Vance transition spokesperson, in a statement sent to TIME.
Members of an incoming President’s staff typically must go through vetting to get the security clearance needed to see classified information. Aides usually need to sign agreements promising to protect sensitive information and go through a background check. Last month, The New York Times reported that some Trump advisers had proposed bypassing those traditional background checks and immediately granting security clearances to many Trump appointees.
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