- Dec 12, 2000
- 25,090
- 9,471
- 136
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/28/us/politics/cia-officer-house-election-super-pac.html
C.I.A. Officer-Turned-Candidate Says PAC Obtained Her [Full, Unredacted, Includes SSN] Security Application [via FOIA Request]
A former C.I.A. officer running for Congress accused a super PAC aligned with Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Tuesday of improperly obtaining her entire federal security clearance application — a highly sensitive document containing extensive personal information — and then using it for political purposes.
Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic candidate challenging Representative Dave Brat of Virginia, sent a cease-and-desist letter to Corry Bliss, the executive director of the Congressional Leadership Fund, which has raised more than $100 million to help Republicans in the midterm elections. She demanded that the super PAC destroy all copies of the form and agree to not use the information in any fashion.
“I write as a former civil servant and as an American, in shock and anger, that you have tried to exploit my service to our country by exposing my most personal information in the name of politics,” she wrote.
The super PAC released a statement on Tuesday strongly denying Ms. Spanberger’s charge, saying that the document was obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request filed with the United States Postal Service by America Rising, a separate Republican-aligned research firm.
...
Graham Wilson, a lawyer for Ms. Spanberger’s campaign, said that explanation, which laid the mistake on the Postal Service, did not ring true. “In this unredacted form, this is not a document that the government can provide under the Privacy Act,” he said.
Ms. Spanberger, 39, said in the letter that she had “clear evidence” that the Congressional Leadership Fund had provided a copy of her security clearance application to “at least one news outlet,” adding, “I am not aware of any legal way that C.L.F. could have this document.” In an interview, she said that she suspected that the group was trying to exploit a brief time when she taught at a private Islamic school funded by Saudi Arabia.
The super PAC validated that suspicion in its response, going on at some length to try to link the school — called “Terror High” in an earlier news article — to terrorist activity.
The application was one of two that she completed for government positions, for a law enforcement job at the Postal Service and for her position with the Central Intelligence Agency.
At a political event this month, Ms. Spanberger said she was approached by a reporter for The Associated Press, who showed her a copy of the security form and said the leadership fund had provided the document on a background basis, meaning that the source would typically not be named. The reporter pulled up a copy of the form on his email, and Ms. Spanberger said she was “100 percent” certain it was hers.
The forms ask for detailed personal information about work and health and also include vital data like a Social Security number.
...
Ms. Spanberger is among more than a dozen Democratic candidates this year with strong background in national security through service in the military or at the intelligence agencies.
Representative Ben Ray Luján, Democrat of New Mexico and the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, sent a letter on Tuesday to more than a dozen candidates in his party making them aware of Ms. Spanberger’s complaint and urging caution.
“This is an official government document that only President Trump’s administration should have in its possession in its unredacted form,” Mr. Luján said.
“To be clear, we have no reason to believe that Republican groups have illegally obtained any of your personnel files, nor are we certain how C.L.F. got Ms. Spanberger’s document in the first place,” Mr. Luján said. “But even the evidence of this isolated incident is deeply troubling.”
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Still believe there was "no collusion"???
C.I.A. Officer-Turned-Candidate Says PAC Obtained Her [Full, Unredacted, Includes SSN] Security Application [via FOIA Request]
A former C.I.A. officer running for Congress accused a super PAC aligned with Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Tuesday of improperly obtaining her entire federal security clearance application — a highly sensitive document containing extensive personal information — and then using it for political purposes.
Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic candidate challenging Representative Dave Brat of Virginia, sent a cease-and-desist letter to Corry Bliss, the executive director of the Congressional Leadership Fund, which has raised more than $100 million to help Republicans in the midterm elections. She demanded that the super PAC destroy all copies of the form and agree to not use the information in any fashion.
“I write as a former civil servant and as an American, in shock and anger, that you have tried to exploit my service to our country by exposing my most personal information in the name of politics,” she wrote.
The super PAC released a statement on Tuesday strongly denying Ms. Spanberger’s charge, saying that the document was obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request filed with the United States Postal Service by America Rising, a separate Republican-aligned research firm.
...
Graham Wilson, a lawyer for Ms. Spanberger’s campaign, said that explanation, which laid the mistake on the Postal Service, did not ring true. “In this unredacted form, this is not a document that the government can provide under the Privacy Act,” he said.
Ms. Spanberger, 39, said in the letter that she had “clear evidence” that the Congressional Leadership Fund had provided a copy of her security clearance application to “at least one news outlet,” adding, “I am not aware of any legal way that C.L.F. could have this document.” In an interview, she said that she suspected that the group was trying to exploit a brief time when she taught at a private Islamic school funded by Saudi Arabia.
The super PAC validated that suspicion in its response, going on at some length to try to link the school — called “Terror High” in an earlier news article — to terrorist activity.
The application was one of two that she completed for government positions, for a law enforcement job at the Postal Service and for her position with the Central Intelligence Agency.
At a political event this month, Ms. Spanberger said she was approached by a reporter for The Associated Press, who showed her a copy of the security form and said the leadership fund had provided the document on a background basis, meaning that the source would typically not be named. The reporter pulled up a copy of the form on his email, and Ms. Spanberger said she was “100 percent” certain it was hers.
The forms ask for detailed personal information about work and health and also include vital data like a Social Security number.
...
Ms. Spanberger is among more than a dozen Democratic candidates this year with strong background in national security through service in the military or at the intelligence agencies.
Representative Ben Ray Luján, Democrat of New Mexico and the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, sent a letter on Tuesday to more than a dozen candidates in his party making them aware of Ms. Spanberger’s complaint and urging caution.
“This is an official government document that only President Trump’s administration should have in its possession in its unredacted form,” Mr. Luján said.
“To be clear, we have no reason to believe that Republican groups have illegally obtained any of your personnel files, nor are we certain how C.L.F. got Ms. Spanberger’s document in the first place,” Mr. Luján said. “But even the evidence of this isolated incident is deeply troubling.”
-----
Still believe there was "no collusion"???