In retrospect, opening that Ashley Madison account wasn’t the best idea you’ve ever had. The good news about your impending divorce is that it probably won’t affect your security clearance. The bad news is that it’s pretty easy to do something stupid and lose your spouse and your job. To learn about divorce mistakes that can threaten your clearance, I spoke with Bradley P. Moss, an associate counsel at the Law Office of Mark S. Zaid. Moss is an expert on federal employment and security clearance law.
“Marriage or divorce doesn’t implicate any risk,” he said. “Where that comes into play is finances and affairs. If you’re married or divorced and stretching your finances to the point that you’re having difficulties paying your debts—possibly putting you into bankruptcy, or you’re in collections on various accounts—that’s a concern for the agency.” That’s just the beginning. “If you’re separated or divorced or you’ve had counseling because you had an affair—in particular if you had that affair with a foreign national—that can raise concerns for the agency in terms of whether or not to continue to grant you, or grant you in the first place, a security clearance. ”
AVOID FLINGS WITH FOREIGN NATIONALS
According to Moss, the worst thing you can do under any circumstance is start a relationship with a foreign national—particularly one from China, Iran, or Afghanistan. That might seem pretty obvious, but this isn’t limited to long-term relationships. What sometimes happens is that the newly-separated will visit a massage parlor and make a big mistake. If money changes hands, and hands wander, and you didn’t check your masseuse’s birth certificate—worry.
“It’s not even necessarily that they know the individuals who were giving them the ‘special massages’ are foreign nationals, so much as they speculate that these women are Vietnamese or Korean or some manner of Asian that might not be U.S. citizens. Generally the explanation they give the agency is: Well I don’t know what their citizenship status is. I certainly didn’t ask that question in the middle of a happy ending!” This raises red flags with agencies, who are now wondering about the person performing the “special massage.” Where is this person actually from? What’s their residency status? Are they foreign nationals? Are they U.S. citizens?
“If the spouse doesn’t know,” said Moss, “we now, on two different levels, have a person who’s raised the risk level by engaging in this one-time activity. I’ve seen that pop up—people losing clearances for nothing more than being stupid and getting happy endings.”
Well, I just won’t tell the agency, you say. Don’t worry: they’ll ask you. The SF-86 is very specific about personal and professional relationships with foreign nationals. When you’re hooked up to the polygraph, doublethink is a difficult thing indeed.
SHOULD I SELF-REPORT?
You made a mistake, whether it was skipping out on your car note or engaging the services of a professional escort, and you’re faced with a decision: do I self-report or not?
According to Moss, “It’s better to self-report in the sense of you have that extra little bit of leverage that you did the proper, honest thing and self-reported it. However, that only goes so far with the agency.” To be sure, if you don’t self-report and you’re caught in a lie on the polygraph, you won’t make many friends at the agency. “If somebody comes to me and asks, ‘Will self-reporting save me?’—I can’t tell them that. I can’t tell you that self-reporting is going to save you. It gives me just a slight piece of additional leverage to work with.”
WHEN DO YOU NEED A LAWYER?
“Call a lawyer before you even submit your SF-86,” said Moss. “I would say about fifty-percent of the problems that I deal with emerge because people could not properly handle the initial documentation.” This might be the SF-86, but it might also be a request by the Department of Defense for derogatory information.
“The DOD will ask people to provide additional information specific to a particular question.” The problem is that applicants, according to Moss, often provide laymen’s explanations as opposed to precise ones, and end up walking into traps.
Unless your record is pristine and your conscious as clear as crystal, consulting a lawyer is an advisable and inexpensive option. “The initial work is very minimal and our goal at that point is actually not to our financial benefit,” said Moss. “If I can salvage your information simply by making sure you properly fill out your SF-86, I get, maybe three or four hours’ worth of time out of you. That’s pennies compared to what I get if you go to a clearance litigation.”
He added, “As much as I like getting that extra money, I also prefer to try to help people just get it right at the beginning.”
