By MICHELLE L. PRICE
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump mentioned Thursday that he’s directing the Pentagon and different authorities companies to establish and launch information associated to extraterrestrials and UFOs due to “large curiosity.”
Trump made the announcement in a social media publish hours after he accused former President Barack Obama of exposing “categorized data” when Obama not too long ago steered in a podcast interview that aliens have been actual.
Trump instructed reporters aboard Air Power One, “I don’t know in the event that they’re actual or not,” and mentioned of Obama, “I could get him out of bother by declassifying.”
In a publish on his social media platform Thursday night time, Trump mentioned he was directing authorities companies to launch information associated “to alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and any and all different data linked to those extremely complicated, however extraordinarily attention-grabbing and necessary, issues.”
Obama, who made his feedback in a podcast look over the weekend, later clarified that he had not seen proof that aliens “have made contact with us,” however mentioned, “statistically, the universe is so huge that the percentages are good there’s life on the market.”
Trump instructed reporters Thursday that when it got here to the prospect of extraterrestrial guests: “I don’t have an opinion on it. I by no means speak about it. Lots of people do. Lots of people imagine it.”
Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump steered this week that he was prepared to discuss it, nevertheless, when she mentioned on a podcast that the president had a speech ready to ship on aliens that he would give on the “proper time.”
That was information to the White Home. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt responded with fun when she was requested about it Wednesday and instructed reporters, “A speech on aliens could be information to me.”
Public curiosity in unidentified flying objects and the opportunity of the federal government hiding secrets and techniques of extraterrestrial life remerged within the public consciousness after a bunch of former Pentagon and authorities officers leaked Navy movies of unknown objects to The New York Occasions and Politico in 2017. The renewed scrutiny prompted Congress to carry the primary hearings on UFOs in 50 years in Might 2022, although officers mentioned that the objects, which seemed to be inexperienced triangles floating above a Navy ship, have been doubtless drones.
Since then the Pentagon has promised extra transparency on the subject. In July 2022 it created the All-Area Anomaly Decision Workplace, or AARO, which was meant to be a central place to gather studies of all navy UFO encounters, taking on from a division activity power.
In 2023, Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, the pinnacle of AARO on the time, instructed reporters he didn’t have any proof “of any program having ever existed as a to do any type of reverse engineering of any type of extraterrestrial (unidentified aerial phenomena).”
The knowledge that has been made public reveals that the overwhelming majority of UFO studies made by the navy go unsolved however the ones which are recognized are largely benign in nature.
An 18-page unclassified report submitted to Congress in June 2024 mentioned service members had made 485 studies of unidentified phenomena prior to now yr however 118 circumstances have been discovered to be “prosaic objects comparable to numerous forms of balloons, birds, and unmanned aerial programs.”
“It is very important underscore that, up to now, AARO has found no proof of aliens, exercise, or know-how,” the report careworn.
Related Press writers Konstantin Toropin and Steve Peoples contributed to this report.
