Applying for job requiring Secret while TS/SCI investigation underway for consulting gig

SECURITY CLEARANCE Q&A
1

For background, I work full-time as a (currently uncleared) DoD contractor. I am on Day 435 since SF-86 submission for a TS/SCI (no poly) part-time consulting gig through another contractor (done with the full knowledge of the first contractor, of course–in fact they were quite enthusiastic about it). While the FSO informs me that the investigation is still “open” in JPAS, I am guessing that most of the actual work (as opposed to the waiting!) is done on that–personal interview was about 7 months ago and all of my references and current/former employers were contacted either prior to that or between then and now.

I’m being recruited for a different full-time position (approximately January start date) that requires only a DoD Secret. Will they have to start over with a brand-new investigation for the Secret, or is there some way that they can use the existing pretty-much-complete investigation? I know that Secrets are generally much faster, so will that save any time?

Of course ideally the TS/SCI would come through before then, and I suppose there’s a chance since a lot of them seem to complete in the 500-day range (right?), but if that doesn’t happen I don’t want the Secret process to somehow short-circuit the TS/SCI.

2

To clarify, the new firm would still support my pursuit/performance of the outside consulting gig, so I do want the TS/SCI to eventually come through. I’m basically just wondering if there’s some mechanism for the Secret to come through before then based on the existing investigation, since those are generally faster.

3

T5 investigations trump T3 investigations. I would let the hiring company/contractor worry about it. It is actually in their favor to let the T5 investigation go through because it wouldn’t be their cost. The logistics of it would be in their court though.

1 Like
4

Thanks for the response! That makes sense. I’ve been upfront with the hiring company that I have the Tier 5 in progress.

In a sensible world they’d be able to take the completed subset of the Tier 5 that’s equivalent to a full T3 and adjudicate for Secret immediately based upon that (while also not killing the T5 for TS/SCI eventually of course!) but I am also not surprised to learn that it doesn’t actually work that way. :slight_smile: