Does the Government Need to Rethink Its Weed Ban to Get Cyber Talent?

Some members of Congress want to know if the government’s prohibition on pot-smoking federal employees is harming its ability to recruit top cybersecurity talent.

Gerry Connolly, D-Va., and Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., have submitted amendments to two sweeping pieces of cyber information-sharing legislation being considered by the House this week that would require the director of national intelligence to report to Congress on how the classification of marijuana as a Schedule I drug affects the government’s cyber-recruiting efforts.

An executive order dating to the Reagan administration outright bans federal employees from toking up -- even off duty. Prospective job candidates in sensitive positions within both the government and at Beltway contractors are queried about their drug use as part of the security clearance process.

FBI Director James Comey caused a kerfuffle last year when he said he was “grappling” with his agency’s no-tolerance policy for hiring employees who admitted using marijuana within the past three years.

“A lot of the nation’s top computer programmers and hacking gurus are also fond of marijuana,” he said in a May 2014 speech. “I have to hire a great workforce to compete with those cyber criminals and some of those kids want to smoke weed on the way to the interview.”

Comey later told members of Congress he was joking, and he had no plans to change the ban.

A report issued last week laid most of the blame for the persistent shortage of cybersecurity professionals in government on the arcane federal hiring process and a rigid pay scale that hasn’t kept pace with the private sector. It did not mention marijuana policies.

The Connolly-Blumenauer amendment is one of dozens of amendments submitted to the House Rules Committee in anticipation of votes this week on two cyber bills, the Protecting Cyber Networks Act and the National Cybersecurity Protection Advancement Act.

The legislation seeks to promote the sharing of cyberthreat information between private companies and the government by providing companies with protection from legal liability for doing so. Civil liberties advocates contend the expanded information-sharing apparatus could be used to bolster government surveillance of citizens.

(Image via sarra22/ Shutterstock.com)