Donald Trump’s determined efforts to ensure that his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has access to our nation’s classified information has been a source of major contention within the White House — and now he’s been exposed for ignoring nearly his entire administration en route to making sure his favorite male relative has his security clearance.
Kushner was granted a top-secret security clearance last year, over the objections of the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, White House Counsel Don McGahn and Chief of Staff John Kelly.
Kelly and McGahn were so upset by the president’s decision to override their concerns that they secretly wrote memos detailing how they were overruled, reports the New York Times:
Mr. Trump’s decision in May so troubled senior administration officials that at least one, the White House chief of staff at the time, John F. Kelly, wrote a contemporaneous internal memo about how he had been “ordered” to give Mr. Kushner the top-secret clearance.
The White House counsel at the time, Donald F. McGahn II, also wrote an internal memo outlining the concerns that had been raised about Mr. Kushner — including by the C.I.A. — and how Mr. McGahn had recommended that he not be given a top-secret clearance.
The existence of the memos make it clear that President Trump lied to the public when he announced that he had “nothing to do” with Jared Kushner’s security clearance.
While White House sources did not reveal what exactly those concerns were, it’s not too hard to guess. Jared Kushner’s family business has ties to multiple foreign governments, including the journalist-killing and terrorist-funding Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which present a huge conflict of interest for a member of the President’s inner circle.
Kushner is already suspected of having funneled American intelligence to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who boasts that Kushner is “in his pocket,” to help him orchestrate a bloody crackdown against his political rivals.
On top of that, the government of Qatar has been discovered helping bail out the Kushner family by using a Canadian asset management company to pick up a 99-year lease on perpetual failson Jared Kushner’s enormous real estate boondoggle, the 666 Fifth Avenue building, right before a devastating $1.4 billion mortgage payment came due.
That doesn’t even begin to cover Kushner’s myriad business interests with the Israeli government, which Haaretz reports has discussed “exploiting” in order to pull even more sway in the White House.
The fact that these two men were so concerned by the president’s decision to overrule them that they both wrote cover-your-ass memos for posterity is a pretty good indication that something monstrously unethical at best and highly illegal at worst is going on behind the scenes, and they want to have their hands clean when it all comes crashing down.
So why, exactly was Donald Trump so intent on making sure that Jared Kushner had access to top-secret information? We’re surely going to find out before this is all over — and the pernicious network of wealthy business interests, idiot sons-in-law, and right-wing radicals that move the modern world is going to be exposed for all to see.
