On Wednesday, November 13, the United States House of Representatives held a hearing on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP). Witnesses told the members of Congress that there is significant evidence suggesting “we are not alone in the universe,” and for decades the U.S. military has been secretly recovering unidentified flying objects to enhance its technology.
The hearing, titled “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth,” lasted over 2 hours during which four witnesses shared new testimonies and addressed Congress members’ concerns and worries regarding Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs).
UAP is the official term used by the U.S. government to refer to unidentified phenomena and is considered less stigmatizing than “UFO.” It also highlights a fact that, as emphasized by witnesses on Wednesday, many unidentified objects in sightings are often seen in the water.
Democratic Representative Jared Moskowitz opened the hearing by urging President Trump to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding UAP.
He stated, “Promoting transparency has always been the goal of both parties in Congress.”
“As we enter a new administration, the elected president talked about the opportunity to declassify UAP information, and I hope he fulfills that promise,” he added.
Republican Representative Nancy Mace also called for increased transparency from the executive branch and intelligence agencies, which had long kept UFO information under wraps.
Mace said, “The reality is, despite the massive budgets provided by taxpayers to the Department of Defense and the intelligence community, their transparency has been abysmal.”
Republican Representative Glenn Grothman also remarked, “When the risks are so high, we cannot avoid the unknown.”
Here are summaries of the testimonies from four key witnesses.
The first witness was former Navy Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet, who told Congress, “In January 2015, when I was the Commander of the Navy’s Meteorology and Oceanography Command, I confirmed that UAPs are indeed real.”
He recounted an incident during military exercises on the U.S. East Coast involving the USS Roosevelt aircraft carrier strike group, overseen by a four-star admiral who was his superior. Gallaudet received an urgent email on the Navy’s secure network from the Fleet Commander’s Operations Commander.
“The email, sent to all subordinate commanders, had the subject line in all caps: EMERGENCY FLIGHT SAFETY ISSUE.”
Gallaudet continued, “The email was brief but shocking, essentially saying: If any of you know what these are, please tell me now. We nearly had multiple mid-air collisions, and if not rectified quickly, we will have to cease the exercises.”
The email included a video now referred to as “Go Fast,” captured by an infrared sensor on a Navy F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet during the exercise. The declassified video showed a fast-moving object with a structure and flight characteristics unlike any known weapon or aircraft.
“The next day, the email vanished from my and other recipients’ accounts without any explanation. Additionally, neither the Fleet Commander nor his Operations Commander ever discussed the matter again,” Gallaudet said.
Gallaudet expressed concern about the lack of follow-up. He emphasized that as the Navy’s Chief Meteorologist at the time, his primary responsibility was to reduce aviation safety risks. However, it was clear that at the flag officer level, no one was addressing the safety risks posed by UAP. Instead, pilots had to deal with these threats on their own without guidance or support.
Gallaudet also noted that UAPs have been observed in the oceans.
“UAPs are interacting with humanity, including unidentified underwater objects in the ocean. We should not turn a blind eye but boldly confront this new reality and learn from it,” he said. Gallaudet believed that American taxpayers deserve to know why the military allocates significant budgets but fails to address this national defense deficiency.
The second witness was former Department of Defense official Luis Elizondo, a former military intelligence officer responsible for investigating UFO sightings at the Pentagon. After resigning in October 2017, he publicly spoke about the restrictions he faced.
Elizondo criticized the intelligence community for over-classifying UAP reports for decades, stating that it was all to hide the fact “that we are not alone in the universe.”
He emphasized that many countries are decrypting UAP spacecraft technology, leading to a “decades-long covert arms race.”
“Let me be clear: UAPs are real,” Elizondo said. “They represent very advanced technology not manufactured by our government or any other government, and they are monitoring sensitive military facilities worldwide.”
“Both the United States and some of our adversaries possess UAP technology,” Elizondo continued. “I believe we are engaged in a decades-long covert arms race.”
Elizondo noted that taxpayer money funded this race, yet for many years, it has not been disclosed to elected representatives and oversight bodies.
Elizondo was the former director of the now-defunct Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP) at the Pentagon. He even claimed to have seen compensation files for injured U.S. personnel during the recovery of UAP spacecraft.
Another witness was independent writer and journalist Michael Shellenberger. He stated that sources in the Pentagon admitted to him the existence of a classified program called “Immaculate Constellation” specifically tasked with organizing information on the military’s understanding of anomalous phenomena.
Regarding “Immaculate Constellation,” Shellenberger submitted a 12-page report to Congress, co-written by a current or former official and a UAP whistleblower. The report claimed that the executive branch “has been managing UAP without the knowledge or authorization of Congress for some time, potentially decades.”
The report also alleged that “Immaculate Constellation” had collected high-quality images of UAPs and recorded firsthand observation results.
He added that he was informed of hundreds, even thousands of such visual evidence, “and not the blurry photos and videos we’ve been shown, but with very high resolution.”
In his written testimony, Shellenberger mentioned a whistleblower cautioning him that merely disclosing the project’s name could trigger government surveillance under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Despite NASA releasing a UAP report in September last year, former NASA Deputy Director Michael Gold urged the agency to do more.
Gold was a member of the NASA UAP Independent Research Team and stated in his testimony that NASA’s investment in UAP research “will send a strong message to the scientific community that UAPs should be taken seriously.”
While many UAPs may be drones or weather phenomena, Gold advocated for NASA to develop new instruments to study these phenomena.
He called for government agencies and academia to “overcome the continuing hurdles of malicious stigmatization blocking scientific discourse and public discussion.”
Gold cited the case of former U.S. Navy pilot and retired Navy Commander Alex Dietrich, who encountered a UAP while conducting exercises with the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier strike group off the California coast. Dietrich was ridiculed by her colleagues, and her superiors ignored the incident. Years passed without any investigation.
Gold stated, “If not for the Advanced Aerospace Weapons Systems Application Program (AAWSAP) taking this matter seriously, Dietrich’s experience might have been lost to history.”
“This is a good example of how the stigmatization of UAP hinders us from collecting valuable information, which is our best and only chance to understand this phenomenon,” Gold added.
“As the saying goes, the truth is out there. We just need to be bold and courageous to face it.”
This hearing was part of Congress’s efforts to investigate UAP and whether government agencies have been hiding evidence from Congress. In July 2023, a similar hearing was also held in Congress.