Foreign Marriage Mitigated After The Fact

Hello Forum,

I am looking for advice regarding my current situation. I was born in the United States along with my father and mother, their father and mother, and so on and so forth. I come from a long line of Americans with no loyalty to foreign countries . After graduating high school I enlisted into the U.S. military and was granted a secret clearance, that is as my enlisted occupation required it.

After honorably separating from the military I went to work for a federal agency that required a nonsensitive clearance, and I had no problem obtaining it. Approximately 3 1/2 years into that position I was offered a promotion at a different agency that required a SECRET clearance, and I had no problem obtaining the secret clearance. So, this brings me to my current predicament.

After one year with the agency described above, I married a Chinese national whom I have known for the last five years. Before I proceeded with marrying the Chinese national whom is now my spouse, I asked my office’s security POC if I needed to report the marriage. I was notified verbally by the security POC that this was unnecessary and I should wait until re-investigation.

The security POC described above retired a year later, which was the beginning of this year. I was having casual conversation with the security POCs replacement last week and my marriage came into the conversation, and at that time I was advised the exact opposite of what the retired security POC stated.

After that, I immediately contacted our agency’s security personnel to inform them of my dilemma. My agency’s security POC was extremely courtesy, polite and professional. She requested that I write a statement outlining the details of my dilemma, which I did promptly. After she received my written statement and the SF86©, she asked me why my spouse was not listed on the original SF86 I completed for this position two years ago.

I explained the following: At that time my spouse and I were nothing more than friends, we were not bound by affection, financial interests or any other obligations. Our affectionate relationship began approximately a year after I was granted the security clearance by my agency. After my explanation she concurred that I exercised bad judgement in my interpretation of section 19 of the SF86, and that I was given bad advice by my office’s retired security POC regarding my marriage.

After all of this, she notified me that she was required to send my clearance to adjudication. She tried putting me at ease by explaining the process and how the adjudicators use the whole person concept. The uncertainty/lack of knowledge in terms of what is to come has been incredibly stressful.

The bottom line is that I exercised poor judgement in my interpretation of section 19 of the SF86, and I was subjected to bad advice by my office’s security POC. Has anyone else been thru a similar situation, or does anyone have any knowledge of a similar situation? Any advice of what is to come? Be it negative or positive.

Anyways, thank you in advance for whatever you can contribute.