Pentagon leak: why young, low-ranking US guardsman had top secret access
- Leak suspect Jack Teixeira is junior rank national guardsman who possessed top secret security clearance at 21
- He was charged with mishandling classified information, in a major embarrassment for the US government
Jack Teixeira gained a high-level security clearance through his job as an IT specialist just two years after joining the Air National Guard – a relatively common situation he allegedly exploited to leak top secret US documents.
As the US government works to assess the damage from its worst unauthorised revelation of restricted material in a decade, officials face questions over why Teixeira – a 21-year-old airman first class who has been arrested and charged with mishandling classified information – had such access at his young age and junior rank.
While it is not unusual for lower-ranking US military personnel to have high-level clearances, Teixeira’s case does however point to multiple apparent breakdowns in the procedures aimed at safeguarding government secrets.
Teixeira “was a systems administrator, so he was a computer specialist that worked in an intelligence unit,” US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin told journalists in Sweden on Wednesday. “Part of his responsibility was … maintaining the network that they operate on.”
Teixeira’s age is “really not the issue,” Austin said, noting that “it’s not exceptional that young people are doing important things in our military”.
Instead, the issue is “how you responsibly execute or carry out your duties and how you protect the information,” he said.