WASHINGTON (AP) — As senators prepare to consider President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for his Cabinet, they will likely be doing so without a well-established…
As senators prepare to consider President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for his Cabinet, they will likely be doing so without a well-established staple of the confirmation process: an FBI background check.
The Trump transition team has so far not signed the requisite agreements with the White House or the Justice Department to allow the FBI to screen his personnel choices, both for the process of obtaining security clearances and meeting the Senate’s usual standards for nominations.
That means the Senate could be asked to vote on Trump’s picks without the usual rigorous background checking meant to uncover personal problems, criminal histories or other red flags that would raise questions about a nominee’s suitability for the job. There already are questions about problematic issues related to a number of the people Trump wants in his administration.
“There are very real liabilities on the security side if you don’t get this right,” said Dan Meyer, a Washington lawyer at the at the Tully Rinckey law firm who specializes in background checks, security clearances and federal employment law.
At issue is a memorandum of understanding under which a president — or in this case, an incoming one — submits requests for name and background checks and the FBI commits to flagging to the White House any adverse information uncovered during the process.
But that document has not yet been signed, with the Trump transition team relying instead on internal campaign aides, allied groups and law firms on the outside to support the personnel effort. Trump for years has regarded FBI leadership with suspicion, in part because of the Russian election interference investigation that shadowed his first term and more recently because of FBI investigations into his hoarding of classified documents and his efforts to undo the results of the 2020 election that led to his indictment last year.
