MEMORANDUM
April 1, 2019
To:

Members of the Committee on Oversight and Reform

Fr:

Committee Staff

Re:

Summary of Interview with White House Whistleblower on Security Clearances

On March 23, 2019, Democratic and Republican Committee staff conducted a transcribed
interview with current White House employee Tricia Newbold. Ms. Newbold came forward as a
whistleblower at great personal risk to expose grave and continuing failures of the White House
security clearance system, including the security clearance adjudications of senior White House
officials. Ms. Newbold is an 18-year, non-partisan career employee of the Executive Office of
the President under both Republican and Democratic Administrations. She currently serves as
the Adjudications Manager in the Personnel Security Office.
Congress is “Last Hope” for Safeguarding National Security
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold explained that she is coming
forward now because she strongly believes Congress must intervene immediately to investigate
and reform the White House security clearance process in order to address the national security
risks she has been witnessing over the past two years. She stated:
I would not be doing a service to myself, my country, or my children if I sat back
knowing that the issues that we have could impact national security.
She explained during her interview that she attempted to exhaust all opportunities to
resolve these concerns at the White House before turning to the Committee:
I raised my concerns initially with [Director of Personnel Security] Carl Kline
directly. There was no resolution. I raised it with his immediate supervisor,
[Chief Operations Officer] Samuel Price. I raised my concerns to White House
Counsel on numerous occasions. I raised my concerns to Marcia Kelly, who was
the Assistant to the President at the time. I raised my time—or concerns to
individuals within Employee Relations, and I raised my concerns to people within
the EEO office. I have recently raised my concerns within the last 6 months to
[Chief Security Officer] Mr. Crede Bailey directly. And I feel that right now
this is my last hope to really bring the integrity back into our office.

 The Committee had requested interviews with Ms. Newbold and other officials in the
White House Security Office, but the White House sought to block these witnesses from
cooperating with the Committee. In order to protect Ms. Newbold’s rights as a whistleblower,
the Committee was forced to schedule her interview on a weekend, without much notice to
Committee Members. Ms. Newbold sat for a full day of questioning and was available until both
Democratic and Republican staff exhausted all of their questions.
Committee staff have spoken with other whistleblowers who corroborated Ms.
Newbold’s account, but they were too afraid about the risk to their careers to come forward
publicly.
Overturning Dozens of Security Clearance Denials
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold stated that White House
security clearance applications “were not always adjudicated in the best interest of national
security.” She explained that she and other career officials adjudicated denials of applications
for multiple security clearances that were later overturned by senior officials in order to grant the
employees access to classified information.
Ms. Newbold explained that, starting in 2018, she began to keep a list of White House
employees whose denials were overturned. Her list eventually grew to 25 officials, including
two current senior White House officials, as well as contractors and individuals throughout
different components of the Executive Office of the President. According to Ms. Newbold, these
individuals had a wide range of serious disqualifying issues involving foreign influence, conflicts
of interest, concerning personal conduct, financial problems, drug use, and criminal conduct.
Ms. Newbold explained that she fully understood that denials could be overruled, but she
was concerned that these decisions were occurring without proper analysis, documentation, or a
full understanding and acceptance of the risks. She stated:
[T]he President can overrule us, but we have an obligation to do our due diligence, to
adjudicate that file the way we are supposed to. Once we adjudicate it, the President
absolutely has the right to override and still grant the clearance, but we owe it to the
President and the American people to do what is expected of us, and our job is to
adjudicate national security adjudications regardless of influence.
She also stated: “[I]f the President wants to override us, he can, but that doesn’t mean at
any time that we should alter the way we do business based on what someone may have come
out with in the end.”
According to Ms. Newbold, her concern was that many security clearance denials were
routinely overruled without following the proper protocols to document why senior officials
disagreed with assessments and without memorializing the risks they were accepting.
For example, she contrasted the actions of her direct manager, Carl Kline, the Director of
the Personnel Security Office, to the proper process that should have been followed:

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 [I]f we have five disqualifiers listed, it is his responsibility and even my responsibility, as
the second level reviewer, if I’m going to overturn my staff, to mitigate all five of them
and to properly highlight those, so if the case does make it anywhere else, they’re able to
see written out in front of them the thought process and the work that went into the
adjudicative recommendation.
She explained that “regardless of what their position is or their title or their affiliation,
our job is to render the adjudicative decision in the best interests of national security.”
Senior White House Official 1—Denial Overruled
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold described several specific cases
in which she and other adjudicators issued denials of security clearances for very senior White
House officials, but were later overruled.
For example, in the case of one senior White House official (“Senior White House
Official 1”), Ms. Newbold explained that both she and the first-line adjudicator issued denials
after the background investigation revealed significant disqualifying factors, including foreign
influence, outside activities (“employment outside or businesses external to what your position at
the EOP entails”), and personal conduct.
However, in the case of Senior White House Official 1, the Director of the Personnel
Security Office, Mr. Kline, overruled the determination by Ms. Newbold and the first-line
adjudicator. Ms. Newbold informed Committee staff that if Mr. Kline wanted to favorably
adjudicate the application, he should have noted in the file how he had considered and mitigated
concerns with each of the disqualifying factors, but he merely noted in the file that “the activities
occurred prior to Federal service.” According to Ms. Newbold, Mr. Kline failed to address all of
the disqualifying concerns listed by Ms. Newbold and the first-line adjudicator.
Ms. Newbold stated that another agency later contacted her after Senior White House
Official 1 applied for an even higher level of clearance. She explained that the other agency
wanted to understand “how we rendered a favorable adjudication.” Ms. Newbold informed
Committee staff that this was an indication of the agency’s “serious concerns” regarding the
White House’s adjudicative outcome. It is unclear whether Senior White House Official 1
received the higher level of clearance from the other agency.
Senior White House Official 2—Security Clearance Application Removed
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold explained that on the same day
she spoke with Mr. Kline about Senior White House Official 1, she mentioned to him that she
was also working on the adjudication of a second very senior White House official (“Senior
White House Official 2”).
According to Ms. Newbold, she indicated to Mr. Kline that the first line adjudicator had
also recommended against Senior White House Official 2’s application for a security clearance.
Ms. Newbold told Committee staff that the first-level reviewer wrote an “extremely thorough”

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 14-page adjudication summary that described multiple disqualifiers, including foreign influence
and outside activities.
Ms. Newbold informed Committee staff that she told Mr. Kline that, based on this
information, she agreed with the first line adjudicator and was planning to write up her own
denial of the application. After learning this information, however, Mr. Kline instructed Ms.
Newbold, “do not touch” the case. Soon thereafter, Mr. Kline adjudicated Senior White House
Official 2 favorably for a security clearance, according to Ms. Newbold.
Senior White House Official 3—Attempt to Change Adjudication Summary
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold explained that she prepared an
adjudication denial of a security clearance for a high-profile official at the National Security
Council (“Senior White House Official 3”).
According to Ms. Newbold, Mr. Kline “called me in his office and asked me to change
the recommendation. I said I absolutely would not.” Ms. Newbold explained further:
I then went on to tell him that the adjudication, how it works is that he has the right to
override me, and he can summarize why he does not concur with my recommendation. I
then followed up this conversation with an email to him, letting him know that my
reasoning for not changing my recommendation was not me being insubordinate; it was
me highlighting that I stand behind my national security recommendation and that he in
his position has the opportunity to override me, using the appropriate mitigators.
After Ms. Newbold refused to change her adjudication recommendation, her security
clearance denial for Senior White House Official 3 ultimately was sustained, and the individual
is no longer at the White House.
Ms. Newbold also stated that she had concerns that Mr. Kline had been having calls “on a
daily basis” with Senior White House Official 3 prior to this determination. Ms. Newbold stated:
“I let him know early on that I had concerns with him having those conversations and it could
potentially lead him to being biased toward the adjudication.” She added: “I advised him I did
not feel he should be in verbal dialogue with the individual. It was unprofessional and it was
opening up the door to hinder him from making a fair, unbiased recommendation.”
Reciprocity Without Review
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold expressed serious concerns
about a reciprocity policy put in place on or around January 2018. According to Ms. Newbold,
“the way it was written was making the EOP less safe and presenting us more of a risk.”
Ms. Newbold explained that in previous administrations, when incoming White House
employees held preexisting clearances, the White House would still review their SF-86 forms
and require them to complete authorizations for credit checks, tax checks, and FBI name checks.
She informed Committee staff that, although their security clearances would not be re-

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 adjudicated, background investigations would still be reviewed to “see if there’s any information
in there that we would deem concerning or that might embarrass the administration.”
Ms. Newbold explained that because of White House employees’ proximity to the
President, the White House Security Office’s adjudication process assesses not just national
security eligibility, but “we also look to identify anything that could embarrass the President, and
we highlight those and bring those to White House Counsel’s attention.”
However, she explained that under the new January 2018 reciprocity policy, “if a
favorable adjudication had ever been rendered on the individual” within the last six years, then
“no further checks would be needed, and we were not allowed to order the investigation or
review the investigation.”
Ms. Newbold explained that she “let Mr. Kline know that this was a serious concern,
because some of the adjudications could have happened 4 years ago, and those are 4 years that
we have unaccounted for” in the adjudication process. She added that “the risks, especially them
coming to the EOP, could be significant.”
Ms. Newbold stated that she raised with Mr. Kline an instance in which, under a prior
Administration, an FBI name check revealed that a reciprocal candidate with an active TS-SCI
clearance was under investigation for criminal activity. That individual was denied eligibility to
work on the White House complex. Ms. Newbold told Committee staff that Mr. Kline
responded, “that was one in I don’t know how many” and that “he was willing to accept the
risk.”
While the January reciprocity policy was changed in June of 2018, Ms. Newbold said that
the new policy still does not address her concerns sufficiently.
Cessation of Credit Checks
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold stated that the White House
Security Office stopped conducting credit checks on applicants to work in the White House
during their initial suitability review. She explained that this prevents the White House from
being able to assess whether applicants “could be susceptible to blackmail, depending on their
debts.” As a result of this change, these issues cannot be examined until after individuals are
already working in the White House complex.
She explained to Committee staff that she raised her concerns with Mr. Kline, but he
responded that “FBI does the credit checks.” According to Ms. Newbold, Mr. Kline failed to
recognize that the FBI does not do credit checks on individuals entering the White House from
other agencies who already have clearances, even if they are several years old:
[A]t one point he said the FBI does the credit checks, and which led me to believe he
wasn’t fully understanding the process where we are. FBI will do credit checks on cases
that they run background investigations on. So if you’re coming over reciprocity, there’s
absolutely no reason for the FBI to even know you’re there. They would never know,
and so we would not gather a credit check on that individual.
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 Need to Assess Damage After Officials with Interim Clearances Are Denied Permanent
Clearances
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold noted the unusually high
number of interim clearances under the Trump Administration, which allows individuals to
access highly sensitive information before their background investigations are complete and they
receive final adjudications. She also expressed concern about the amount and sensitivity of
classified information that was provided to officials who operated for extended periods of time
with interim clearances, but who were later deemed unsuitable for access to classified
information.
Ms. Newbold informed Committee staff that “we were getting out of control with the
interim clearances.” This included White House officials who were temporarily given the
highest level of clearance through access to Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI). Ms.
Newbold stated that in May 2017, another agency expressed concerns to the White House about
the number of individuals at the White House operating with interim SCI security clearances, as
well as the length of time they were working under these interim security clearances.
She explained: “They did mention to our office that they wanted to reduce the amount of
interim SCIs that were coming in, and I believe that conversation took place in the beginning of
May 2017.” She added:
[I]t’s always a concern when you grant someone access to not only national security
information, but also SCI access and they don’t have a proper—or a completed
background investigation that was adjudicated final.
Ms. Newbold explained that multiple White House officials who had held high-level
interim security clearances were subsequently denied permanent security clearances. In the case
of two high-level White House officials, she explained that they had been denied permanent
clearances based on concerns relating to their personal conduct, foreign influence, and, for one
candidate, foreign preference concerns.
However, Ms. Newbold was not aware of whether, or the extent to which, the White
House had conducted an analysis of the volume or sensitivity of highly classified information
accessed by these individuals. For example, Ms. Newbold had the following exchange with
Committee staff relating to Senior White House Official 3 and another senior White House
official who were ultimately denied permanent security clearances after working with interim
clearances:
Q:

So for both of these individuals who were working in the national security field
inside of the White House on interim clearances for some period of time, which
was many months, do you have concerns that they were able to do that? Do you
have concerns about what kind of information or that they had access to classified
information, based on now the information that you learned from their
background checks?

A:

Absolutely. We did raise or I raised my concerns.
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 Insufficient Security of Personnel Files
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold explained that under previous
administrations, personnel security files would “never leave our sight,” but “[w]ithin the last 2
years, they were moved out of our supervision into the subbasement” where unescorted
individuals “had direct access to the files that did not work for the EOP.” She recounted an
instance in 2018 when two unauthorized GSA employees were in the file room, and she had to
report them to the Chief Security Officer. After this incident, the Chief Security Officer had the
files moved into the security office’s space, which is secured and locked, but which has regular
outside visitors. She expressed concern that “the files are currently out in the open in empty
cubes in bins” and that “someone’s file might just be sitting in a bin easily able to be seen.”
Inadequate Experience and Staffing in Adjudications
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold stated that she has “never seen
our office so ill-staffed and with such lack of experience.” She explained that the office is
currently operating with a vacancy in the Personnel Security Director position, as well as
vacancies in multiple first-line adjudicator positions because many of the experienced
adjudicators left the office after unsuccessfully raising their national security concerns:
Some of my staff have left. They shared the same concerns as well. And they raised
those concerns, but they didn’t go anywhere.
She stated that the current staff experience ranges from never having adjudication
training to having fewer than three years’ experience adjudicating security clearances. Ms.
Newbold emphasized the need for additional, experienced staff in the White House Security
Office:
We do need skilled staffers. We need people who have handled these type of cases
before. I can’t do it alone. And especially since I’m being removed from supervision, I
won’t be able to have the oversight I know that we need to bring the office back to the
place it needs to be.
Reports of Retaliation by White House Officials
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold described a series of retaliatory
and harassing actions she was subjected to as retaliation for her efforts to repeatedly raise
national security concerns with the security clearance process.
On January 30, 2019, the current Chief Security Officer, Crede Bailey, suspended Ms.
Newbold without pay for 14 days. The Notice of Decision on Proposed Suspension conceded
that Ms. Newbold had “no prior formal disciplinary action” in her 18-year career and received a
rating of “Exceeds Expectations” on her performance appraisal in 2017, the first year of the
Trump Administration.
Nevertheless, the Notice stated that she was suspended for refusing to “support new
procedures your supervisor implemented.” The specific basis for her suspension was an
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 allegation that she failed to follow a new policy created by Mr. Kline in November 2018 to scan
documents in separate .pdf files instead of a single .pdf file when sending them to other agencies.
Nothing in the Notice alleged that Mr. Kline’s new policy had anything to do with making
records more secure. Yet, the Notice criticized her for “constant defiance of authority” and a
“pattern of this type of defiant behavior.” The Notice stated:
In fact, you stated you would continue to do what is best for the Executive Office of the
President (EOP) and the Division. You are not in charge of the Personnel Security
Division (PSD) or EOP security. You may not see a complete picture or be aware of the
requirements of the entire EOP. If a change is made that you do not think is best for the
EOP or the Division, you are still expected to comply. If you believe an instruction
violates a regulation or rule, you may raise your objection to your second line supervisor
or the Office of General Counsel; however, you are still obliged to follow the instruction
first. If you believe an action violates the law, you should raise this to your second line
supervisor or the Office of General Counsel. If they inform you that the instruction is
valid, you must comply with the instruction.
Contrary to the Notice’s claims, however, Ms. Newbold stated that Deputy Assistant to
the President Bill Hughes previously told her “that I should no longer communicate with White
House Counsel and bring our concerns to them.” She added that Mr. Hughes “said if I wanted to
speak to White House Counsel, I’d have to go through the proper chain.” However, she
explained further: “But the reason we went—or I went to White House Counsel is we weren’t
getting relief from [Chief Operating Officer] Sam Price or anywhere else.”
Ms. Newbold filed a complaint with the Office of Special Counsel on February 12, 2019,
requesting a stay of this suspension. Because her suspension expired on February 14, 2019, the
Office of Special Counsel did not act on her complaint.
Ms. Newbold explained to Committee staff that following her suspension, she was
informed that Mr. Hughes had removed her from her duties as the second-level adjudicator on
security clearance applications. According to Ms. Newbold, security clearance applications now
go directly from the initial personnel security specialist to the current Chief Security Officer,
bypassing Ms. Newbold and eliminating any opportunity for her to raise objections to the
granting of security clearances. In the first week Ms. Newbold returned from her suspension, the
Chief Security Officer also announced a plan to restructure the security office to remove Ms.
Newbold from any direct supervision of employees.
Ms. Newbold noted that she fears additional reprisals and losing her job. She stated:
“I’m terrified of going back. I know that this will not be perceived in favor of my intentions,
which is to bring back the integrity of the office.”
According to Ms. Newbold, the retaliation against her for raising her national security
concerns began in January of 2018, when Mr. Kline began taking actions that were designed to
humiliate her as a result of her rare form of dwarfism. According to Ms. Newbold, Mr. Kline
repeatedly altered her office environment to cause impediments to her work, such as physically
elevating personnel security files out of her reach.

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 Ms. Newbold informed Committee staff: “These are files that we work with every day.
That’s an essential part of our job.” She explained that when she let Mr. Kline know this was a
problem, he replied, “I have people, they can get the files for me.” Ms. Newbold responded, “no,
sir, that’s not acceptable accommodation.” She raised her concerns repeatedly to Employee
Relations personnel and other White House officials, but it took approximately two months to
make an accommodation so she could reach the files.
According to Ms. Newbold, the files were moved out of her reach again in the spring of
2018 and yet again in October 2018. She explained the impact these actions had on her and the
staff she supervised:
As little as I am, I’m willing to fight and stand up for what I know is right, and
they’ve always respected that about me. And it was hard for them to see me in a
situation in which I kind of had to submit to my subordinates and ask them, would
you mind going to get me that file? It’s humiliating to not be able to
independently work and do the job that you need.
Ms. Newbold contrasted these actions with an instance in which security files had been
removed from her reach in 2014 during the Obama Administration. She informed Committee
staff that on the same day she raised the issue, the Chief Administrative Officer for the White
House “personally walked herself down immediately and went to the file room and said these
files are going to be moved to where Ms. Newbold can reach them and they’re going to be
moved now, and that was it.”
Conclusion
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold repeatedly made clear that her
concerns are based on national security—not on personal animus towards anyone in the White
House. In fact, she complimented several Trump Administration officials, including former
Chief of Staff John Kelly, who she said was “very receptive and understanding of the importance
of national security and the information which I was telling him.” She also complimented
former Deputy Chief of Staff Joe Hagin, who she said “does take national security very seriously
and was very attentive in understanding the briefing I did provide.”
Ms. Newbold also described an instance when then-Senior Counsel to the President Jim
Carroll defended her integrity to another White House official based on Mr. Carroll’s work with
Ms. Newbold during the Bush Administration:
And so the White House counsel, who I had worked with in the past, who knows me very
well, spoke up and said: I have worked with Tricia and she would only protect
individuals because of the trust factor, and this is what we’ve always respected about her.
During her interview with Committee staff, Ms. Newbold explained that she is coming
forward to Congress now because she believes it is her duty, and because the widespread
problems with the White House security clearance system cannot be addressed without
independent, outside oversight. She stated:

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 I came forward today because I just—I do not see a way forward positively in our office
without coming to an external entity, and that’s because I have raised my concerns
throughout the EOP to career staffers as well as political staffers. And I want it known
that this is a systematic, it’s an office issue, and we’re not a political office, but these
decisions were being continuously overrode.

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