Politics : Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

Dozens of young White House staffers have been suspended, asked to resign, or placed in a remote work program due to past marijuana use, frustrating staffers who were pleased by initial indications from the Biden administration that recreational use of cannabis would not be immediately disqualifying for would-be personnel, according to three people familiar with the situation.

The policy has even affected staffers whose marijuana use was exclusive to one of the 14 states—and the District of Columbia—where cannabis is legal. Sources familiar with the matter also said a number of young staffers were either put on probation or canned because they revealed past marijuana use in an official document they filled out as part of the lengthy background check for a position in the Biden White House.

In some cases, staffers were informally told by transition higher-ups ahead of formally joining the administration that they would likely overlook some past marijuana use, only to be asked later to resign.


“There were one-on-one calls with individual affected staffers—rather, ex-staffers,” one former White House staffer affected by the policy told The Daily Beast. “I was asked to resign.”

“Nothing was ever explained” on the calls, they added, which were led by White House Director of Management and Administration Anne Filipic. “The policies were never explained, the threshold for what was excusable and what was inexcusable was never explained.”

In February, NBC News reported the White House intended—for some candidates—to waive the requirement that all potential appointees in the Executive Office of the President be able to obtain a “top secret” clearance. The rules about past marijuana use and eligibility for the clearance vary, depending on the agency: For the FBI, an applicant can’t have used marijuana in the past three years; at the NSA, it’s only one. The White House, however, largely calls its own shots, and officials at the time told NBC News that as long as past use was “limited” and the candidate wasn’t pursuing a position that required a security clearance, past use may be excused.

Asked about the policy and its effect on the administration’s staffing, a White House spokesperson disputed the number of affected staff, but said the Biden administration is “committed to bringing the best people into government—especially the young people whose commitment to public service can deepen in these positions,” and noted that the White House’s approach to past marijuana use is much more flexible than previous administrations.

“The White House’s policy will maintain the absolute highest standards for service in government that the president expects from his administration, while acknowledging the reality that state and local marijuana laws have changed significantly across the country in recent years,” the spokesperson added. “This decision was made following intensive consultation with career security officials and will effectively protect our national security while modernizing policies to ensure that talented and otherwise well-qualified applicants with limited marijuana use will not be barred from serving the American people.”

A candidate’s personal drug history, barring past convictions for possession, is largely based on the honor system, as well as supplemental interviews with family and friends by the FBI—although lying on the 136-page SF-86 form is a felony, and effectively bars a candidate from ever working for a federal agency. Over the years, some rules have been relaxed or altogether eliminated (the existence of nude photos of a candidate are no longer automatically disqualifying, for example).

Some of these dismissals, probations and remote work appointments could have potentially been a result of inconsistencies that came up during the background-check process, where a staffer could have, for example, misstated the last time they used marijuana. The effect of the policy, however, would be the same: The Biden White House would be punishing various staffers for violating thresholds of past cannabis use that would-be staffers didn’t know about.

Previous drug use can pose problems for obtaining a security clearance. While practices across the federal government vary, in general agencies may consider the type, frequency, and recency of drug use as mitigating factors when granting a clearance.


The Biden administration has attempted to modernize the White House’s personnel policy as it relates to past marijuana use, which has disproportionately affected younger appointees and those from states where marijuana has been decriminalized or legalized. (Marijuana, of course, remains illegal in the eyes of the federal government.) The number of allowable instances of past marijuana use was increased from the Trump and Obama administrations—a reflection of the drug’s widespread use—and the White House approved limited exemptions for candidates whose positions don’t require security clearances. Those employees, like all those at the White House, must commit to not using marijuana while serving in the federal government and must submit to random drug testing.

The president, however, remains the final authority on who can receive a clearance, and the chief executive can overrule agency judgments on eligibility, as President Donald Trump did when he granted his son-in-law Jared Kushner a top-secret clearance over the objections of the intelligence community and his own counsel.

“I find it absurd that, in 2021, marijuana use is still part of a security clearance background check,” Tommy Vietor, a veteran of the 2008 Obama team who subsequently worked as a National Security Council spokesperson, said Thursday. “To me, marijuana use is completely irrelevant when you’re trying to decide whether an individual should be trusted with national security information.”

In past administrations, White House staff have also had their applications denied, or the jobs they’d started abruptly yanked, because of marijuana use. In the earliest days of the Trump era, multiple people—some mid-tier, some more senior-level—had jobs they had already accepted pulled by White House brass after flunking urine tests that showed signs of recent marijuana use, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

The marijuana policy has tripped up the appointments of even senior White House officials in past administrations. Ben Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser in the Obama White House, wrote in his memoir that his interim security clearance was initially denied because of past marijuana use. Alyssa Mastromonaco, who served as deputy chief of staff for operations in the Obama administration and has a self-described “love of the ganj,” wrote in Vice in 2017 that, after filling out her SF-86, she “went home and flushed all the pot I had stashed in my underwear drawer.”

In the end, Mastromonaco was allowed to join the administration, she wrote, “but I was randomly drug-tested pretty much once a month for the first year, and regularly after that.”

But would-be staffers in the Biden administration whose dream jobs were derailed by an opaque system now feel their own truthfulness has been used against them.

“It’s exclusively targeting younger staff and staff who came from states where it was legal,” the former staffer said.

https://www.scribd.com/document/382737647/MortSahlFan-Song-List

Re: Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

They shouldn't even be asking staffers about this.

Re: Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

Yeah, getting fired for doing legal stuff.

Then again, Biden was always a "reefer madness" addict.

https://www.scribd.com/document/382737647/MortSahlFan-Song-List

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Re: Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

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Re: Biden White House Sandbags Staffers, Sidelines Dozens for Pot Use

I agree 100% and have been making this case everywhere I can. I don't even bother to preface who I like or dislike - gotta hold their feet to the fire, regardless of who goes down. I notice the same people who'd cheer my comments on Trump (on Fakebook) now stay silent or shrug, while the ones who objected want to hold my coat now that I've gone after Biden.

When it comes to the important issues, Biden is more conservative. Biden supported every single war, Trump started none. One pushed NAFTA, one got rid of it. Biden wrote The Crime Bill, Trump wrote Criminal Justice Reform, Prison Reform, HBCU funding, etc.. Biden supported the repeal of Glass-Steagull; supported the Telecommunications Act, The Patriot Act (he actually wrote the "counter-terrorism" bill which became the Patriot Act), Bankruptcy bill (but somehow student loan bankruptcy was exempted, despite the US being over a trillion delinquent).

Nixon said the last thing he'd ever do was recognize "Red China" – and it was! But then again, he had to play the cold warrior bullshit because he made his bones in politics with the Alger Hiss case.

If Trump got re-elected, you'd have some resistance, but now there's very little. In every political circle, all I see are excuses, or the same old, "Yeah but Trump called these people _______"..

We had an agreement to remove our troops in a month, but Biden is extending that, as well as the illegal Syrian airstrike.

You don't vote for someone and THEN wish they turn out alright - it hasn't happened in my lifetime. You use your vote (and as a bloc, since that's so chic) as leverage. If you keep voting for the evil of two lessers, why would they ever give you anything? Biden appealed to more of the GOP than progressives (if there really are any).. Lip service doesn't go far with me, and if AOC had any integrity, she would demand a "skinny" bill from Pelosi, but she wants to be a power-player I'm sure, but I liked her for about 10 minutes, along with Tlaib.. They eat their cake while everyone else starves, pretending Biden is going to save us.. Pelosi wouldn't impeach W. for lying us into multiple wars, but she impeached Trump over nothing, which I knew was baloney.. If he was an agent of Russia, why would she approve of all his budget increases?


And then for the Democrats to suddenly support the CIA and FBI? And W. Bush cronies? This is truly unbelievable. Because Trump made a few tweets? Schumer didn't even hide it as he told that Maddow "The CIA will screw you seven ways from Sunday" (or whatever that threat was). I didn't like Obama, but I didn't like the de-legitimacy (Kenya - give me a break) and so they doubled-down on Trump winning because of a few bots. Every time someone says "Russian", I ask if they changed their vote because of Russia - none.

Biden has always been tough on marijuana (Kamala, too, ugh) and don't understand how people get fired for doing things are NOT illegal. When Biden has his silly "beer summit" with Obama, Gates, some cop, it's "cool"..

Biden only got where he is in politics was because his wife and daughter died. He never stuck his neck our for anything, and with time, you'll become head of Judiciary, whatever.. He had no compassion for Anita Hill, while some Southerner Republican (Simpson, I think) did. There's a TON of video of Biden doing some fucked up shit - touching, sniffing, and the allegations from women.

The bad thing is that people will defend Biden's policies and think "Oh, this is what liberalism" is. Our media is only getting worse, and information/truth doesn't mean much if it's on page 98 in the very back. Twitter censored the NY Post (shitty newspaper, but actually the oldest) for posting a true story about The Biden family and their dealings. After the election, the FBI admitted they had been investigating for months.

https://www.scribd.com/document/382737647/MortSahlFan-Song-List
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