Not really. I know a litany of people who had TS/SCI clearances in the 90s. It was literally a job requirement for entire divisions of the US govt.
Some fed contacted every single reference I gave, my old scoutmaster, and the minister of the church I was a janitor for during college. Top Secret was notoriously more difficult in terms of paperwork and scrutiny of your past.
The article about Bongino's waiver made it clear that TS was a requirement for FBI employment, an entire division of the government, although it wasn't clear if that was everyone, or just the higher level administrative staff.
I've been a reference interviewed in the processes before. It was not exactly rigorous. (It would have been hard to be, frankly... I had no knowledge of them doing anything shady, and they had no specific prior area of concern to try to grill me specifically on.)
I was confused that I wasn't even asked if I was a citizen, or that my friend listed me as a reference because I'm pretty sure he knew.
There is an entire industry built around clearing people, your tax dollars pay them. Of course everyone you listed was contacted, that’s the whole point.
How is filling out an SF-86 hard?
Maybe what you meant was, justifying the reason to get a clearance in the 90s was harder. Perhaps that is true. Getting a clearance isn’t hard.
Divulging where you've lived for the past 10+ years, having agents contacting your references, etc for "Secret" is not very onerous or difficult.
Given that, your subsequent statement that "Top Secret was notoriously more difficult in terms of paperwork" seems to be pointless.
As a former federal government employee, all of this is also required as part of the standard background check. People will show up in a black sedan and interview your neighbors, all you past employers and people who knew you at each residence. This happened for me and I’ve never had any real security clearance (nor required it).
Just because it’s work doesn’t mean it’s rare. My father and most of his coworkers all had TS clearance in the 90s. It required flying out to Dallas (if I recall correctly) for the polygraph. Lots of work but very common.
The number of poepl that hold top secret clearance (assuming its the same thing...) is 1.3mil
Most people just back into a clearance without realizing they need one, and bounce right through the process.
If you haven’t been convicted of a felony it’s basically falling-off-a-log easy to get cleared. The whole process is a charade.