Getting an interim if my prior clearance is expired?

Hello, everyone

At a prior employer, I had my secret clearance. Back when I was going through the process, in about 2018-ish, I was denied the interim but ultimately granted the clearance in early-to-mid 2019, which I understand is typical. I have since left that position for the employer that I’m currently with. My current employer told me when they hired me that they would need my clearance, but that ended up being untrue, and so my clearance has been inactive since January of 2020 and has since expired in January of 2022.

There will be nothing new on my SF86 except for this one new work position and one change in residence. I was going to fill out my new SF86 to essentially mirror my prior SF86, which does include some light drug use and a small criminal record involving alcohol and marijuana (most charges dismissed in court) in my teens and early 20’s (all over a decade ago at this point). I would guess that those details are why I was denied interim back in 2018.

I’m now accepting a position which will once again require a clearance, and so I’m preparing to go through the whole process again. My question is, what are my chances of getting granted an interim clearance THIS time? Will my prior clearance status play any sort of a factor in having an interim granted and potentially improve those odds? Or will this potentially new investigator see the details on my SF86 and say, “I need to investigate that” even though all of that stuff has been investigated once before?

I thought that a “secret” clearance was good for ten years, so I’m not sure why your clearance would have expired in 2022.

Based on what you have said, it is likely that they just want an updated SF-86 and the secret clearance will be granted pretty quickly.

Hi, thanks for answering this.

It’s expired because my current employer hasn’t used it for more than two years. It’s been inactive since January of 2020–I thought that >2 years of inactivity resulted in automatic expiration. But maybe I’m mistaken?

I realize that I didn’t make that very clear in the original post so I’ve just edited that in.