On 9 May 2025 the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency issued a Statement of Reasons to a software engineer at a defense contractor. She answered, requested a hearing, testified over Microsoft Teams, and was denied on 30 January 2026: 266 days, 43 of them a shutdown furlough of every DOHA administrative judge (ISCR Case No. 24-00695). DOHA publishes no average. One case, not a forecast.

What follows is Defense Office of Hearings and Appeals procedure, not legal advice. Anyone holding an SOR should take their facts to a security clearance attorney.

Who does the DOHA process cover?

Short answer: Contractor and private-sector employees, plus NATO direct-hires and Red Cross or USO nominees overseas, under EO 10865 and DoD Directive 5220.6. Not military members, not DoD civilians. Holding SCI does not put you outside it.

32 CFR 155.2(f) says the part “[d]oes not apply to cases for access to sensitive compartmented information or a special access program.” It excludes a case type, not a person. DOHA decides collateral eligibility: “access to Confidential, Secret, or Top Secret information” (155.3(b)). A contractor who holds or is seeking SCI still gets the full SOR, answer, hearing and appeal process on that collateral eligibility; only the SCI or SAP access determination sits outside part 155, with the cognizant agency. In ISCR Case No. 21-00277 (19 July 2022) the applicant was granted SCI eligibility in 2016 and lost it in 2018, and DOHA heard his collateral case anyway. If you hold TS/SCI and an SOR arrives, the 20-day clock below is yours.

Paragraph (e) removes three categories: clearances withdrawn because access is no longer needed, interim clearances pulled mid-investigation, and administrative withdrawals without prejudice. The reach is wider than “contractor employee.” Section 155.3(a) also covers any U.S. citizen who is a NATO direct-hire employee or selectee holding or requiring NATO certificates of security clearance, and any U.S. citizen nominated by the Red Cross or United Service Organizations for assignment with the Military Services overseas. It excludes citizens seconded to NATO by a U.S. agency or recruited through one at NATO’s request.

Two things have been outrun by practice. Part 155 has not been amended since 1994 and still names the Defense Industrial Security Clearance Office; the 2026 decision shows DCSA issuing the SOR. Item 8 still says the applicant “shall appear in person,” while DOHA’s 2024 guidance says hearings are usually held on Teams. The deadlines are live; the furniture around them is not.

What happens between the SOR and the hearing?

Short answer: Twenty days from receipt to file a sworn answer that admits or denies each allegation and requests a hearing. Miss it and the case can close without one.

App. A item 4 is specific about form: under oath or affirmation, admitting or denying each allegation, since “[a] general denial or other similar answer is insufficient.” A hearing happens only if you ask there. The next sentence allows an extension “only upon a showing of good cause.” Under item 5, no timely answer lets DOHA stop processing and revoke any clearance. That makes answering the SOR the most consequential step.

Item 6 is the regulation’s most encouraging line. Where your answer shows the allegations are unfounded or the evidence insufficient, Department Counsel shall act “including but not limited to withdrawal of the SOR.” That list is open by its terms. Some cases end there, before any judge writes anything.

If nobody asks for a hearing, a judge decides on paper. Item 7 gives Department Counsel 20 days from receipt of your answer to demand a hearing even when you did not. Otherwise you get 30 days from receipt of the File of Relevant Material for rebuttal, extenuation or mitigation, your last chance to add evidence. Item 8 requires at least 15 days’ notice; the applicant above got 46 days, which the shutdown vacated. A clearance suspended under 32 CFR 155.6(d) gets expedited procedures.

DOHA hearing or personal appearance: which track are you on?

Sources: DOHA Industrial Security FAQ Q1 (archived 19 November 2025); DOHA’s mission overview for the panel of three; 32 CFR 155.3(a); App. A item 29; EO 12968 sec. 5.2(a)(6), 60 FR 40245. The right column is thin because EO 12968 sets only a floor, and sec. 5.2(c) says it “creates no procedural or substantive rights.”

What does the Government have to prove?

The standard is not preponderance. The judge in ISCR Case No. 24-00695 set out the order of proof: the Government must establish disqualifying conditions “by substantial evidence,” which is “more than a scintilla but less than a preponderance,” after which “the burden shifts to the applicant to rebut, explain, extenuate, or mitigate the facts.” Item 15 gives the applicant “the ultimate burden of persuasion,” and disproving mitigation never returns to the Government.

Two rules sit on top. The SEAD 4 guidelines (archived ODNI copy, effective 8 June 2017) direct that any doubt “will be resolved in favor of the national security.” In Department of the Navy v. Egan (1988) the Supreme Court wrote that clearance determinations “should err, if they must, on the side of denials.” The judge weighs the whole-person concept under SEAD 4 Appendix A para. 2(a), across thirteen guidelines lettered A through M.

Mitigation must be documented, not asserted. A 2019 Appeal Board decision restated a 2008 holding that judges may reasonably expect documentation that debts “have been resolved or are being resolved”; favorable findings on three of six Guideline F allegations did not save that applicant. That 2019 ruling predicts nothing about 2026.

What actually happens in the hearing room?

DOHA’s prehearing guidance of 22 July 2024 describes an adversarial proceeding, the Government represented by a Department Counsel. Applicants may appear alone, with an attorney they select and pay for, or with a non-lawyer such as a family member. Hearings are “usually conducted via an online platform (e.g., Microsoft Teams).”

One fact decides whether fighting is realistic: “The Administrative Judge does not have the authority to issue a subpoena.” Witness appearance and document production are “purely voluntary,” and costs fall on whoever calls the witness. A supervisor who would vouch for you but will not appear is unavailable.

Nobody is sworn in. The judge instead warns every witness about 18 U.S.C. 1001, which makes a knowing false statement to a federal agency a crime. All witnesses face cross-examination. The hearing is open unless you ask to close it, and item 12 bars any inference from that request.

The word “judge” should not mislead. DOHA administrative judges are DoD attorneys designated by the DoD General Counsel (32 CFR 155.5(b)(8)-(9)), not Article III judges and not administrative law judges under 5 U.S.C. 3105. Their independence is a duty on the General Counsel, not statutory tenure.

How does the appeal to the Appeal Board work?

Watch the anchors. The 20-day answer clock runs from receipt of the SOR. The 15-day notice-of-appeal and 45-day brief clocks both run from the date printed on the judge’s decision. File the notice on day 15 and 30 days remain for the brief, not 45.

Two mechanics catch appellants out; one relief valve rescues them. Days “mean calendar days,” but “[i]f a due date falls on a Saturday, Sunday, or federal holiday, the due date will be considered to fall on the next business day.” The filing must also arrive: “A deadline is not satisfied by mailing or postmarking a document on or before the due date.” Neither appeal deadline is absolute. Under item 28 a late notice of appeal “shall not be accepted… except for good cause,” and DOHA’s instructions say to send it anyway: “If you are submitting your notice later than 15 days from the date of decision, you must explain why it is late,” because “[t]he Board may allow a late NOA only upon a showing of good cause.” Item 31 lets you request more time for the brief, and if the brief is late anyway, “[t]he Board may set aside a default order if the appealing party shows good cause.” A missed date is something to explain, not a reason to stop filing.

Item 29 is why the hearing outranks the appeal: “No new evidence shall be received or considered by the Appeal Board.” DOHA’s instructions name one narrow exception: “There are only a few situations in which the appeal brief may rely on something other than error by the Judge, such as if you submitted documentary evidence by mail or email and the Judge’s decision indicates that the evidence was never received.” Item 32 otherwise asks only whether harmful error occurred: whether findings rest on evidence a reasonable mind could accept against all contrary evidence, with deference to credibility findings; whether procedures were followed; and whether rulings are arbitrary, capricious, or contrary to law. A 2019 Appeal Board decision held that arguments which “amount to a disagreement with the Judge’s weighing of the evidence” are “not sufficient to establish harmful error.” An issue left out of the brief may be treated as error not shown.

The Board can affirm; remand to correct identified error, specifying the action; or reverse, but only “if correction of identified error mandates such action.” A remand produces a new decision, appealable again. After that, “[e]xcept for cases covered by Directive ¶ E3.1.23, there is no further appeal from an Appeal Board decision.” That exception is not a route to court: where a case turns partly on evidence the applicant could not confront, any final adverse determination is made “only by the Secretary of Defense… based on a personal review of the case record.” Separately, 32 CFR 155.6(e) lets the Secretary act outside the process entirely, a power that “may not be delegated” and whose exercise “shall be conclusive.” DOHA publishes no reversal rate.

What happens if you lose?

Under 32 CFR 155.3(b) an unfavorable decision denies the application and revokes any existing clearance, “thereby preventing access to classified information at any level.” It follows you through the systems employers check, so it helps to know where determinations are recorded and how little the public denial-rate record shows.

App. A item 37 sets the bar at “1 year from the date of the initial unfavorable clearance decision.” The word “initial” is load-bearing: the year runs from the judge’s original decision, so an appeal spends time inside the bar rather than adding to it. A second bar in 32 CFR 155.6(b) works differently. When a case closes for failure to cooperate DOHA may revoke and stop processing, but nothing is barred yet: “Requests for resumption of case processing and reinstatement of a security clearance may be approved by the Director, DOHA, only upon a showing of good cause. If the request is denied, in whole or in part, the decision is final and bars reapplication for a security clearance for 1 year from the date of the revocation.” Refusal is a choice the rule preserves, since an applicant may “elect on constitutional or other grounds not to comply,” but it may prevent DOHA from deciding at all.

Reapplying is not something you do yourself. Item 38 requires the employer to file, on the terms of a new application; you then give DOHA the adverse decision and evidence that the conditions “have been rectified or sufficiently mitigated.” If reconsideration is refused, item 40 makes that final and adds another year, and item 41 confirms that reapplying confers no greater rights.

A reimbursement route for lost earnings exists and is nearly unreachable. Items 42 through 45 require a favorable decision first and clear and convincing evidence of both conditions: that the action was the primary cause of the loss, and that it was due to gross negligence of the Department of Defense “at the time the action was taken, and not in any way by the applicant’s failure or refusal to cooperate.” Item 43 adds the deadline easiest to walk past: claims “must be filed with the Director, DOHA, or designee, within 1 year after the date the security clearance is granted.” Item 45 excludes lost employment opportunities and “counsel’s fees.” Your lawyer is never paid back.

A denial is not a loyalty finding: under section 7 of Executive Order 10865 an adverse determination is made in terms of the national interest and “shall in no sense be a determination as to the loyalty of the applicant concerned.”

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I take a DOHA Appeal Board decision to federal court?

Not as of right; nothing in DOHA’s materials provides a judicial route. Egan (1988) held something narrower than usually reported: the Merit Systems Protection Board may not review “the substance of an underlying security-clearance determination in the course of reviewing an adverse action” under 5 U.S.C. 7513. That limits one forum on one question, not every court on every question.

Do I need an attorney at a DOHA hearing?

The regulation does not require one. Weigh that against the structure: the Government always has a Department Counsel, the applicant carries the ultimate burden, and legal fees are excluded from reimbursement even when you win.

Does filing an appeal pause the one-year reapplication bar?

No. App. A item 37 runs the year from the initial unfavorable decision, so time at the Appeal Board runs inside it. The separate bar in 32 CFR 155.6(b) is dated from the revocation, but attaches only once a request to resume processing has been denied.

Can I judge my odds from DOHA’s published decisions?

Not reliably. App. A item 47 requires decisions to be indexed and published in redacted form, and favorable ones are published: ISCR Case No. 22-02423 (12 April 2024) ends “eligibility for access to classified information is granted.” DOHA’s FAQ says cases closed out before they reach the Hearing Office produce no written decision, and “[o]nly cases adjudicated by DOHA Administrative Judges in the Hearing Office result in written decisions.” The published set samples cases that went the distance, not everyone who got an SOR.

For anyone holding an SOR in 2026 the decisive work happens early, on paper. The answer buys the hearing, and a strong one can end the case under item 6. The hearing is where the record closes for good. Calendar every deadline from the right anchor, and get advice from someone who can read your file. See also what a revocation means day to day and DOHA’s Industrial Security FAQ (archived 19 November 2025).