If Kushner indeed still retains his clearance, there’s an unmistakable double standard at play. Career officials, many of whom spend decades in service of their country, are subject to a different set of rules than those under the protection of the powerful. That’s never how the system has worked, nor is it how it should work. The classified information Kushner has access to is no less sensitive, and, in fact, his position in the West Wing—where I spent the past few years—exposes him to a much broader array of the most classified information and programs in the U.S. government than he would in most other executive branch roles.

These are the facts: Jared Kushner held suspicious meetings with Russians officials and operatives that he failed to disclose when he applied for a security clearance. If he weren’t the president’s son in law, he’d have been frogmarched out of the White House long ago. Why does he still have access to America’s biggest secrets?