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Are you 100% positive that the position requires a secret clearance? The reason I ask is that there are several positions that require you to be eligible to get a security clearance so you can actually start work on a project and the company applies for your security clearance at the same time. Also there are a lot of positions that require you to be eligible to get a security clearance, but a security clearance itself is not required to work on the project. These positions are with US Govt projects/agencies that prefer US citizens over foreign workers (with green cards or work visas) for reasons such as preventing unintentional data breaches or not having the overhead of maintaining different access control networks, etc.
If this new position is anything like what I mentioned above, I see no reason why you wouldn't want to join the new company. Unless of course, you have reason to believe that your security clearance will not come through or will be delayed.
Possessing a security clearance in this area is a definte boost for your career. Good luck!
Do you have to denounce your other citizenship if you are a dual citizen in order to get a clearance?
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe you cannot be a dual citizen when getting a clearance. You do have to denounce your foreign citizenship, unless there are other circumstance I am unaware of.
I worked with a guy who was let go because he would not give up his dual citizenship to Iran. Now, maybe it was because it was Iran, but I'm not sure they make exceptions.
I *might* take up a new position that requires Secret Clearance. I've never had a clearance before and am a naturalized US citizen with family and relatives abroad (in my native country of origin). I did some reading online and learnt that "foreign influence" is one of the 13 or so categories that one would need to pass to qualify for a clearance, and it is quite subjective from what I could tell.
So, the question is - should I wait till I get the clearance approval before I quit my current position? It looks like it could take months and in that event, would there be some sort of a temporary/interim clearance that would be approved in a shorter timeframe, and if yes, is it safe to quit the current position once that is approved?
Ultimately, my question is - would it be okay to tell the employer that I can't quit my current position till I get an approval (and is it the standard/expected process)? What are some options available in this case?
Someone can also correct me on this if I'm wrong, but getting a clearance is extremely expensive. I can't imagine that a company would pay for it without you already working for them. So I don't see how they would be ok with you telling them, "well, I'm not going to quit my job until I get cleared." If you don't pass, I think they still have to pay for the background research.
I don't believe that the Government will grant a security clearance to you unless you are in fact working for the company that initializes the clearance process. The OP might consider discussing this deatil with their new company hiring advisor, specifically verifying that the new company will move forward with the clearance process prior to the OP becoming an actual employee. I also think that the clearance is specifically for the person .... so the OP works for Company A, and has a job offer from Company B. Company B begins the clearance process ($$) and the OP is granted the Secret clearance. Even if the OP then refuses to take Company B's offer .... he still is cleared. Any company that then hires him/her into a valid Secret level requirement job just has to initiate the paperwork with their Government customer to activate the clearance. I just doubt that either the Government or the new company will move forward with the clearance process on a contigent employee.
Now the Government will do this .... they will complete the clearance process while the prospective Federal employee sits on someone else's payroll. But I don't believe that they will allow a commercial entity to do this same thing.
I believe that the fact that the OP is a naturalized citizen just means that the clearance process is a little more involved. Smarter folks out there can correct me, but I think that only the POTUS is required to be American born. Congressmen/women, cabinet heads, agency leads .... that requirement isn't on the books for any of them. (OK ... that's a leap on my part ..... I really don't know this to be fact .... anyone??)
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Carlingtonian
This is the most uninformed comment I've ever seen on this forum, and there are some doozies here. Do you know how many naturalized citizens work for the Intel Community, in very sensitive positions, at the highest clearance levels? I know a few. And like Ben & Jen said, they have a much greater appreciation for the United States than most native-born citizens have--because they didn't have their citizenship just handed to them.
Do you even know what a naturalized citizen is? It doesn't necessarily mean someone who came to the US as an adult. They might have been merely born in an another country and then brought here as an infant or child refugee, on an R visa, for instance--e.g., Holocaust survivors, refugees from SE Asia, etc. Whatever the case is, they had to go to great effort to come here. And in many cases, they came from someplace where you can get killed for saying or writing the wrong thing or just being from the wrong ethnic group (and probably have relatives who WERE killed for such reasons). Places where the police routinely get bribes. Or where all the poor people just starve. They will be the first to tell you that the problems we have in the US are "high-class problems."
As to the question of dual loyalties: Apparently you don't realize the depth to which the investigators go in investigating these things and establishing any kind of potential conflict of loyalties. And in many cases, naturalized citizens (especially refugees) have a bias AGAINST the government of the country they had to flee.
Remember: That traitor Bradley Manning was a native-born citizen. As was Timothy McVeigh. And Ted Kaczynski. And Eric Rudolph. And all the neo-Nazi lunatics. The married State Department INR couple who were recently arrested for giving secrets to the Cubans--native-born (and Anglo, by the way) US citizens. FBI turncoat Robert Hansen.
I was born here, and I can get pretty critical of our government and sometimes even cynical about our country, with its intractable problems, ongoing triumph of stupidity, and worsening corruption. And then I talk to a naturalized citizen and realize that overall, our country is really a pretty good one.
I suggest you do the same sometime.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South Jersey Styx
I know several people who are naturalized citizens who were in the military. Fought in wars and risked their lives to defend this country. That's something I haven't done (and I was born in the USA).
Your emotional tirades don't change the facts. People who were raised in other countries MAY have been set up as spies.
When you both have taken courses in reading comprehension and logic, you might want to visit this thread again, and read what I said in my first post.
I did NOT say that all naturalized citizens are spies. In fact the percentage is probably tiny, but we know that it happens (as it can also happen with citizens born in the US), since our technology ends up in foreign hands quite frequently, and some of that has been traced back to such spies.
Nor did I say that naturalized citizens don't ever love their country. Did you guys actually think I said something like that? Don't you stop for so much as a millisecond to think about your posts? But THINK about what a spy would be like after naturalization. Is he going to be carrying around a bomb everywhere and muttering dire threats to the USA? No, he's going to act like a happy guy heaving sighs of relief at finally being able to enjoy our freedoms.
That doesn't change the fact that MOST naturalized citizens are truly, honestly glad to be here. It just means that a few are putting on an act. In fact they might actually be glad to be here and might even be loyal Americans ...... except that the ultimate loyalty is to the country of their birth.
Your emotional tirades don't change the facts. People who were raised in other countries MAY have been set up as spies.
When you both have taken courses in reading comprehension and logic, you might want to visit this thread again, and read what I said in my first post.
I did NOT say that all naturalized citizens are spies. In fact the percentage is probably tiny, but we know that it happens (as it can also happen with citizens born in the US), since our technology ends up in foreign hands quite frequently, and some of that has been traced back to such spies.
Nor did I say that naturalized citizens don't ever love their country. Did you guys actually think I said something like that? Don't you stop for so much as a millisecond to think about your posts? But THINK about what a spy would be like after naturalization. Is he going to be carrying around a bomb everywhere and muttering dire threats to the USA? No, he's going to act like a happy guy heaving sighs of relief at finally being able to enjoy our freedoms.
That doesn't change the fact that MOST naturalized citizens are truly, honestly glad to be here. It just means that a few are putting on an act. In fact they might actually be glad to be here and might even be loyal Americans ...... except that the ultimate loyalty is to the country of their birth.
What this assumes is that there is an available american at least as qualified. For instance, under your proposed policy scientists like Einstein and Fermi would not been able to be part of the Manhattan Project.
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe you cannot be a dual citizen when getting a clearance. You do have to denounce your foreign citizenship, unless there are other circumstance I am unaware of.
I worked with a guy who was let go because he would not give up his dual citizenship to Iran. Now, maybe it was because it was Iran, but I'm not sure they make exceptions.
Not automatically true. This page has a good explanation of what disqualifies you. You have to express your willingness to give up your dual citizenship and destroy your passport if you have one.
I had to research this recently. My husband and I are both dual citizens. He is eligible for clearance because he became an Irish citizen automatically by birth, and has never applied for a passport. I am ineligible for clearance because I applied for and was granted post-nuptial citizenship.
FWIW, it says on that site that country of citizenship doesn't matter.
So, the question is - should I wait till I get the clearance approval before I quit my current position? It looks like it could take months and in that event, would there be some sort of a temporary/interim clearance that would be approved in a shorter timeframe, and if yes, is it safe to quit the current position once that is approved?
I am a naturalized citizen (came to the US when I was little), and when I got out of college, I got a government job. Needing a security clearance, it took me about a year before I got my security clearance.
They do have interim clearances, and for me, when I got my interim, in some cases I was able to see the materials but not interact with the computers, which didn't make sense at all, as I have to have someone with the clearance sit with me, and I'll tell him what commands to enter. Luckily I don't work at that site a lot or it would have driven me crazy, lol.
I guess what I'm saying is, you may have a wait quite a while to get your initial clearance.
I just quit my job that I was in the process of getting a secret clearance for. The process started in late August. Since I hold a dual citizenship (I'm a naturalized U.S. citizen as well as a citizen of my country of birth which is not considered to be a hostile country to the U.S.). I was interviewed twice by investigators and after the last interview (in November) the investigator said everything looked good and they were just waiting to close the investigation. Our "security guy" informed me that there is a back log of some sort and that is why things are taking so long. Not sure if this is helpful at all but they didn't think there was going to be any issues. Good luck!
I did NOT say that all naturalized citizens are spies..
No--you just said that they should all, as a group, be presumed to be unworthy of a security clearance and denied mere consideration. I would be willing to bet that far more native-born Americans have been found guilty of espionage than naturalized ctizens, proportionately as well as numerically.
It's one thing to assert that everyone who applies for a clearance should be investigated for any possibility of a conflicting allegiance. That should be done--and is. It's quite another thing to suggest that everyone born in a foreign country--from Arnold Schwarzenneger to George Soros to General Shalikashvilli to Zbigniew Brzezinski--OUR FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR--to Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright--TWO FORMER SECRETARIES OF STATE--to John Deutsch--FORMER CIA DIRECTOR--should be presumed unworthy.
Should someone who emigrates from, say, Iran, be looked at closely in a security investigation regarding their allegiances? Yes--just like everyone else. In the case of Iran, there are a lot of people who fled that country when the Shah was deposed, knowing that the revolutionaries would kill their entire family; those people are, as one would expect, rabidly against the current regime. Just like Holocaust refugees could be counted on to be among the most solidly anti-Nazi citizens. Just like South Vietnamese, Cuban, and Cambodian refugees are among the most vehemently anti-Communist American citizens you can find. Just like a lot of immigrants from former Soviet Bloc countries absolutely hate the Russian government.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Woof
Nor did I say that naturalized citizens don't ever love their country.
No--you only said they should be treated as second-class citizens when it comes to a huge portion of federal government positions.
If you're worried about spies, worry about people like Aldrich Ames (born in the River Falls, Wisconsin), Kendall Myers (born in Washington, DC), Jonathan Pollard (born Galveston, TX), Julius and Ethel Rosenberg (born in New York, NY), Bradley Manning (born in Crescent, OK), John Walker Lindh (born in Washington, DC), Adam Gadahn/Pearlman (born in Oregon).
In fact, what I think these cases show is that the presumption of loyalty on the part of US-born citizens is (or at least was at one time) a weak point in the investigation process.
Last edited by Carlingtonian; 02-24-2012 at 05:06 PM..
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