A lawyer who had full security clearances for nearly 30 years and a long history of representing whistleblowers of every political stripe — including the one who in 2019 revealed that President Donald Trump had called Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy for political dirt on Joe Biden — was among the people who had their security clearances revoked on Monday.
The Trump administration has been pushing to revoke security clearances for a number of officials who once worked under Biden.
The Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard — who has faced accusations that she is herself a Russian asset— posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday to announce that Mark Zaid’s security clearance had been revoked.
She said she had also revoked security clearances, at Trump’s direction, from former national security adviser Jake Sullivan, former U.S. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco and former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, as well as people who had once prosecuted Trump for various civil and criminal offenses, including New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
“The move to revoke my security clearance, which occurred without any due process as is required by well-established laws, is simply another example of the authoritarian nature of this administration,” Zaid said in an email Tuesday. “President Trump is clearly following Shakespeare’s lead in Henry VI in being afraid of the lawyers who would hold him accountable. Unfortunately for him, all this does is embolden me to fight back more.”
Zaid co-founded Whistleblower Aid, a nonprofit group that helps whistleblowers gain legal representation.
The director of the group, Libby Liu, said in a statement that they believe the administration yanked Zaid’s clearance because the president has “animus” toward Zaid.
Zaid represented a national security whistleblower who “revealed the president’s attempt to blackmail Ukraine,” Liu said. He took that case “without fear or favor,” just like he has taken on many other cases since the Clinton administration, she added.
“He has done nothing to betray the trust that comes with the security clearance he has held for decades. Revoking it is the very definition of weaponizing the power of government against its citizens,” Liu said.
However, Zaid did not need to access classified materials while representing the whistleblower in 2019. And in 2020, the Trump administration actually increased his level of clearance to allow him access to top secret and sensitive compartmented information.
Removing security clearance in such a way goes against decades of precedent.
An executive order issued in 1995 by then-President Bill Clinton suggests that revocation or sanctions for officials with security clearances requires review, and can typically only occur if they “knowingly and willfully grant eligibility for or allow access to classified information” in violation of existing clearance rules. Sanctions can include reprimand, suspension without pay and removal.
Zaid has long expected the move by the administration.
Last November, Republican lawmakers called on the Trump administration to strip security clearances from 51 intelligence officials they deemed “dirty” because they had signed a letter suggesting that the Hunter Biden laptop story bore the hallmarks of a “Russian information operation.” Gabbard said Monday she had revoked clearance for those officers.
In a lengthy interview just weeks ago, Zaid told The Record that maintaining security clearances was crucial in his work because it allowed him to better represent his clients, particularly those coming to him from the shadowy world of intelligence.
Whistleblowing spies, like those who work at the CIA, must keep their identities and affiliations with government agencies secret. They need lawyers who can help them do that, especially if they want to report wrongdoing, Zaid said.
“I would be one of the few lawyers who would have the security clearance necessary to be able to know that they work at the CIA and possibly see the classified information that underlies their case that I would review at whatever agency might be involved,” he said.
Just last month Trump revoked Biden’s security clearance. In an executive order signed last week, he stripped clearances from Perkins Coie, a law firm that worked with Democrats during the 2016 election. A month earlier, Trump stripped clearances for another law firm, Covington & Burling, which had done pro-bono work for former special counsel Jack Smith.
Perkins Coie sued the administration on Tuesday, alleging that Trump’s executive order violates its speech and due process rights under the First, Fifth and Sixth Amendments. The order also violates the Constitution’s separation of powers, the firm claims.
Trump’s order targeting Perkins Coie not only removed the firm’s security clearances but also discouraged all federal officials from talking to Perkins Coie attorneys. The firm’s lawyers were barred from all federal buildings, too.