The White House faced new questions Thursday about whether Donald Trump’s closest aide, Natalie Harp, had access to US government secrets without security clearance. Harp, who is executive assistant to the president of the United States, worked in the White House for a year without routine clearance, the MS Now network reported Thursday. He refused to submit the relevant forms for unknown reasons, according to two anonymous sources cited by MS Now. Only when the White House counsel’s office raised the issue, and when Trump himself became involved, did Harp file paperwork for a federal background investigation and belatedly be granted clearance, according to the report. Norm Eisen, former White House ethics czar, said: “It is shocking that an aide who has potential exposure to the nation’s most sensitive secrets allegedly did not receive a security clearance. Treating access to confidences as a casual job benefit is an outrageous way to handle our national security.” Eisen, co-founder of Democracy Defenders Action, a nonpartisan group dedicated to free and fair elections, added: “This is the continued incompetence of an administration willing to set aside our country’s interests, ignore established protocol and make the White House vulnerable to intelligence risks to appease Trump.” under scrutiny this week after his name was invoked by Jon Ossoff, a Democratic U.S. senator from Georgia. Harp has reportedly sent adoring letters to the president of the United States, helps him write social media posts, and has been nicknamed “the human printer” because she provides him with favorable coverage impressions. MS Now’s reporting on his prolonged lack of a security clearance sparked criticism of the deal from former White House officials across the political spectrum. statement: “Natalie Harp has a security clearance like everyone else, and is a loyal and hard-working member of President Trump’s team.” David Axelrod, who was Barack Obama’s chief strategist and senior advisor, posted on Richard Painter, George W. Bush’s former chief ethics lawyer, noted that all White House staff typically undergo background investigations, but only some require additional security clearance, depending on their access to classified information. “I’m not entirely clear what’s been going on here with Natalie Harp,” he said. “My perception of most of what he’s doing has nothing to do with classified information.” But Painter added: “If you accompany the president on his travels on Air Force One, in close proximity where you can overhear conversations that could include classified information, you need to have security clearance.” Otherwise, even if she doesn’t give advice on how to handle Iran and he’s on the phone about the next attack on Iran, at that very moment she needs a security clearance.” “Kushner was only granted clearance after Trump ordered it, overriding concerns raised by intelligence officials,” Sherman said. “Too often, the president has given more flexibility with security clearances to those closest to him, which is a troubling trend given the type of sensitive information they can have access to, such as national security information, contacts with world leaders and other highly sensitive information.” Trump, who couldn’t pass a credit check, let alone a security check, would have no problem allowing someone without authorization to be in such a sensitive position for a year. “After all, this is a guy who meets with Putin without any aides and praises Kim Jong-un. Natalie’s fanatical devotion and willingness to be at Trump’s side when he needs it plays into his pathological need for attention.” who spoke at the 2020 Republican national convention in Washington. She joined the far-right One America News Network in 2020 and began working for Trump two years later, as he plotted his political resurrection. Since then, she has been frequently at his side. CNN reported that in 2023, when Trump was due to appear in court in New York, Harp discovered there was no seat for her in his motorcade, so she jumped into the trunk of a pickup truck, insisting that he had personally asked her to attend. And last month, when Trump secretly changed planes in Turkey after an alleged Iranian assassination threat, Harp was among a small group that accompanied him on a military plane while other officials and journalists remained aboard an Air Force One decoy. This week Ossoff attacked Trump in a campaign speech, accusing him of being. more interested in building his White House ballroom and traveling with “Natalie” than in fulfilling the duties of the president. The comment sparked an extraordinary reaction from the White House and sent social media into overdrive, with users speculating about the nature of Harp’s relationship with Trump. His loyalty to the president has also been documented in the book Regime Change, published this year by New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan. They reported that Harp had written Trump letters of intense admiration. the one who told him: “You are all that matters to me.”
