i spoke to former senior intelligence officials who served both republican and democratic administrations. they said it is very unusual for someone at this level of a position to be acting on an interim security clearance for so long, and precisely because of the nature of the position he had, staff secretary. in effect, someone controlling the information flow to the president. and that information flow includes an enormous amount of highly sensitive, highly classified information. we heard raj shaw during the white house press briefing say this would not be an issue unless there was an issue for national security. but to margaret's point, this is clearly an issue of national security, because the background clearances are not just about whether you are a citizen with good character, they are whether you have risks in your background that could open you up to risk of blackmail. this would be one of those things. so, you know, very relevant to his security clearance. now we know exactly why that security clearance was held up. >> to be clear, that means someone in the white house