Whatever happened to Standard Form 312?

November 1, 2005

It hasn’t come up in a while, but whatever happened to the discussion about SF 312? As you may recall, anyone who works for a presidential administration and needs clearance to receive classified materials has to sign something called Standard Form 312, which is a nondisclosure agreement for federal officials. In the context of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby, there’s one part of the form that’s particularly relevant.

Question 19: If information that a signer of the SF 312 knows to have been classified appears in a public source, for example, in a newspaper article, may the signer assume that the information has been declassified and disseminate it elsewhere?

Answer: No. Information remains classified until it has been officially declassified. Its disclosure in a public source does not declassify the information. Of course, merely quoting the public source in the abstract is not a second unauthorized disclosure. However, before disseminating the information elsewhere or confirming the accuracy of what appears in the public source, the signer of the SF 312 must confirm through an authorized official that the information has, in fact, been declassified. If it has not, further dissemination of the information or confirmation of its accuracy is also an unauthorized disclosure.

For a while, the conservative line was that Rove and Libby learned about Plame from reporters. SF312 made that claim irrelevant; even if they did hear it from reporters, they were bound to “confirm through an authorized official that the information has, in fact, been declassified.”

But now that we know for certain Rove and Libby were the ones doing the leaking, their flagrant disregard for the nondisclosure agreement is even more obvious.

For that matter, as Henry Waxman reminded the president a few months ago, the White House is “required to impose administrative sanctions — such as removal of office or termination of security clearance — if Mr. Rove or other officials acted ‘negligently’ in disclosing or confirming information about Ms. Wilson’s identity.”

Maybe now would be a good time to renew the call for Rove to lose his security clearance? Helen Thomas nagged Scott McClellan about this back in July, but he blew her off. We have a lot more information now than we did in July and Rove’s role in this scandal should, at an absolute minimum, cost him his clearance.

> the White House is “required to impose administrative sanctions — such as removal of office or termination of security clearance — if Mr. Rove or other officials acted ‘negligently’

Silly boy. Rove did not act negligently, it was entirely intentional. Therefore this requirement doesn’t apply…

  • this scandal should, at an absolute minimum, cost him his clearance.

    It should, but it won’t. Normal “shoulds” don’t apply in the Bush Crime Family.

  • Keep in mind that Rove is not a cabinet official. He is a political advisor. In the summer of 2004 Newsweek ran a photo of Rove in a conference room in which Homeland Security was being discussed. Think of it: the political advisor involved in the homeland security department. That should have been a scandal then, and should be a scandal now. If Bush wants Rove to decide when the security alerts happen, he should have him confirmed like any other policy advisor.

    Point being, since Rove is technically not a policy advisor or cabinet member, but rather “merely” a political advisor, the question of removing his security clearance should be pretty clear-cut. He is not in a “need to know” position, so his clearance should be revoked, period.

  • Rules? What rules? Didn’t you know? All rules governing the treatment of national security and the security of the United States have been suspended for the duration of the George W Bush Administration. This administration is not to be inconvenienced by those pesky regulations. Don’t you know, rules interfere with the efficient and effective undermining of the system of checks and balances. There will be no internal investigation, no congressional oversight, no apology, and nobody gets fired.

    That is all.

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