The coveted security clearance might be the closest many Americans ever will come to knowing what it's like to be an immigrant in the United States.
It not only gives them the opportunity for a stable, high-paying job; it requires a bureaucratic U.S. government stamp of approval, one that they can't get on their own and need a sponsor even to start. It's also a process that lasts for an indeterminate period of time and, once denied, has no course for appeal.
Unlike a green card, there's no deportation penalty for being denied a security clearance, just the unrelenting wonder of what might have been. So before you go filing your SF-86 (the form you fill out to start the clearance process), make sure you have all your documentation and get these six areas together before they start investigating you.
In all of these cases, lawyers are available to help guide you through the process -- if the process is that important to your future.
1. Financial Health
Depending on your security clearance level and the state of your financial affairs, the investigating agency might find financial issues you didn't know you had. It's not uncommon for people to report finding out about forgotten fees, payments and collections that got crossed in the mail during a clearance investigation.
Of course, a leftover balance on a car or credit card isn't going to tank your clearance. The government is looking for areas of extreme debt that might make you susceptible to bribes or influence by a foreign power. If you worry that this describes you, have a plan of action to tackle or consolidate your debt and implement it before applying for a clearance.
2. Drug and Alcohol Abuse
This is probably one of the most asked-about and troublesome areas of the security clearance process. When it comes to alcohol, investigators only would be able to determine you have a problem in two ways. The first is through your personal contacts (more on that later). The second is through your alcohol-related incidents.
To mitigate any alcohol-related issues with your security clearance, you can provide a statement of reasoning to the form, showing you've taken appropriate steps to handle your issues. All the mitigating circumstances surrounding alcohol issues can be found on the Department of State website.
When it comes to illicit drug use, first-time applicants are always unsure about acknowledging marijuana experimentation as a youth. Everyone wants to be honest, but everyone is afraid of being denied a top-secret clearance because they caved to peer pressure as a teen. The truth is that it's worse to lie on an SF-86 than to admit you experimented in high school.
Investigators are more concerned with your judgment being impaired by drug use, the potential for someone to use your addiction as leverage against you and the kind of people you have to associate with regularly to buy illegal drugs. Like being caught in alcohol-related incidents, including a statement of reasoning that explains what you've done to mitigate that risk will help secure your clearance in spite of drug-related incidents.
3. Why You Left Previous Jobs
Adjudicators checking into your work history aren't looking to check the references on your resume -- not necessarily, anyway. They're going back at least 10 years and talking to your bosses and even other employees to talk about what kind of employee you were and why you left the jobs you held.
For those who left civilian jobs to join the military or those who went to college or elsewhere to learn a different profession, this may be no sweat. But if someone had to leave their job because they committed a crime in the course of their work -- be it theft, embezzlement, destruction of property or anything at all -- this could be a killer.
4. Character References
The SF-86 will ask you to list non-family members as character references, ones to whom the investigators most certainly will talk. It's important to consider who you list. This means not just considering who you list, but their associations as well.
In talking to these references, you not only will be considered based on who they are and their references, but what they say about you as well. The questions asked might surprise you. They want to know what kind of person you are, what kinds of things you have done in the past (this is where they might find out you experimented with dope after all) and what kind of temperament you have, even under pressure.
5. Weddings/Divorces
Just being divorced isn't going to wreck your chances of getting approved for a security clearance. Going into massive debt because of a divorce and not having a plan to pay it off or get out of debt might wreck those chances. Even if you aren't in debt, too many divorces and weddings might hurt your chances.
Security clearance adjudicators are going to look into the circumstances surrounding your weddings and divorces. If you had extramarital affairs (or a string of them), it could make you susceptible to foreign influence, through blackmail or otherwise. Affairs with foreign nationals will make investigators think twice, even if it was a one-night stand. Allegations of domestic abuse in regard to divorce also are taken very seriously.
With weddings, it's important to know who you're marrying. Marrying a foreign national or an undocumented national will hurt your chances. When it comes to your personal relationships, remember to disclose everything on the SF-86.
6. Your Family
Finally, your family could torpedo your chances of a security clearance. This is not only because they know so much about you, but also they have lives and connections of their own, ones you may not even know about. In fact, what they have done can sink your clearance. Guilt by association is alive and well in security clearance investigations.
Unless you're a member of a mafia family, it's OK to have black sheep, small-time tax cheats or even some people struggling with an addiction in your family. Those are automatic disqualifiers, but distancing yourself from those people (if you know who they are) is a good idea.
-- Blake Stilwell can be reached at blake.stilwell@military.com. He can also be found on Twitter @blakestilwell or on Facebook.
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