Displaying items by tag: Rob Porter

Anyone who has ever worked for the U.S. who had to get to their office through three sets of locked doors is outraged by the fact that White House staff without permanent clearances are handling classified materials the way a paperboy handles the news. Anyone who ever wondered if the peace lecture they attended with a classmate would affect their clearance application is shaking their head. Anyone who ever felt outrage at Edward Snowden, or Chelsea Manning, is fuming over what’s going on at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

The president has claimed that lives of some of his staff members are being ruined, without due process, because of accusations of misconduct, “true or false,” “old or new.” His assertion shows that Trump misunderstands the concept of due process. Historically, redress for accusations against public figures is extremely limited. If it was otherwise, political speech would be chilled, there would be less investigative journalism, and the internet, a modern bastion of free speech, would be hobbled demonstrating there’s a good reason for the policy.