--- title: What We Know About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing description: A day of hearings on Capitol Hill yield a lot of sensational claims—and not a lot of science. canonical: https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/ author: Jeffrey Kluger article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2023-07-27T18:57:52.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-19T07:25:26.706Z article:section: Science og:title: What We Know About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing og:description: A day of hearings on Capitol Hill yield a lot of sensational claims—and not a lot of science. og:url: https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3414e72d5fa2c38d/698a32b6b3fce34dbc0c9578/UFO-department-of-defense-footage.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2507 og:image:height: 1410 og:image:alt: UFO-department-of-defense-footage og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What We Know About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing twitter:description: A day of hearings on Capitol Hill yield a lot of sensational claims—and not a lot of science. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3414e72d5fa2c38d/698a32b6b3fce34dbc0c9578/UFO-department-of-defense-footage.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # What We Know—and Don't Know—About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=fc7dab96-c019-45f8-816d-5f8223759dbd&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Whistleblower Tells Congress U.S. Is Concealing Program That Captures UFOs [Watch (HLS stream): Whistleblower Tells Congress U.S. Is Concealing Program That Captures UFOs](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/QxxRUOHn.m3u8) (2:23)  _Published 2023-07-26. A former intelligence official testified at a U.S. House subcommittee hearing, and claimed that the government has been covering up a longstanding defense program that collects and reverse engineers unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and has found "nonhuman biologics" at alleged UFO crash sites._  by [Jeffrey Kluger](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-kluger/)  ## Jeffrey Kluger Editor at Large Jul 27, 2023 6:57 PM UTC A former intelligence official testified at a U.S. House subcommittee hearing, and claimed that the government has been covering up a longstanding defense program that collects and reverse engineers unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and has found "nonhuman biologics" at alleged UFO crash sites.  by [Jeffrey Kluger](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-kluger/)  ## Jeffrey Kluger Editor at Large Jul 27, 2023 6:57 PM UTC Jimmy Carter waited four years before he at last went public with the news that he’d seen a UFO. [It was in 1969](https://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/18/this-day-in-politics-096937), when Carter was a private citizen—between his service as a Georgia state senator and the governor of the state—that he saw a mysteriously luminous object hanging in the sky one night after attending a Lion’s Club meeting. Carter kept the sighting to himself, [deciding only in 1973](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1977/04/30/ufo-over-georgia-jimmy-logged-one/080ef1c3-6ff3-41a9-a1e4-a37c54b5cbca/) to file his report with the International UFO Bureau in Oklahoma. The verdict? Nothing to see here. A little basic astronomical forensics revealed that what Carter saw on that date and at that spot in the sky was Venus—whose extreme luminosity has [fooled no shortage](https://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/watchtheskies/03may%5Fmaximumvenus.html) of UFO believers before. Carter is not the only prominent public official who has shown an interest in what are now more decorously referred to as “unidentified aerial phenomena” (UAP). In 2016, then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, when asked in an interview about UAP, [responded](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/11/us/politics/hillary-clinton-aliens.html): “I don’t know. I want to see what the information shows. There’s enough stories out there that I don’t think everybody is just sitting in their kitchen making them up.” In 2021, former President Barack Obama responded to a similar question, [saying](https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/19/politics/barack-obama-ufos/index.html), “There’s footage and records of objects in the skies…We can’t explain how they moved, their trajectory. And so, I think that people still take seriously trying to investigate and figure out what that is.” [Yesterday](https://time.com/6298287/congress-ufo-hearing/), the House Oversight subcommittee on National Security, the Border and Foreign Affairs, took the matter seriously indeed, holding a day-long meeting with multiple witnesses, most conspicuously former Air Force Major David Grusch—a man who had quite a story to tell. In 2019, Grusch [was asked](https://apnews.com/article/technology-government-and-politics-f5f24502d97072fd4bef34b6fe36c81d) to lead a government task force on UAP sightings. It was not a frivolous assignment. U.S. Navy pilots and other American military forces [have reported](https://time.com/6273575/possible-ufo-sightings-investigations-video/) more than 650 instances of [flying objects moving](https://time.com/6177650/congress-ufo-hearings/) in all manner of ways that defy conventional aeronautical physics—loop-the-looping, changing directions with a nimbleness no existing technology could manage. None produced detectable exhaust. Some turned with a suddenness that would have produced deadly g-forces to any human who might be aboard. In 2020, the [Pentagon released videos](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rO%5FM0hLlJ-Q) of three of the Navy sightings, confirming that whatever the UAP are, they’re very real. **_Read more:_**[_Here’s the Truth About the Bizarre ‘Alien Spacecraft’ That Buzzed Our Solar System_](https://time.com/5446125/alien-probe-oumuamua/) But Grusch’s testimony contained a lot more than claims of unexplained sightings. According to the witness, the U.S. military has for decades been in possession of the remains of crashed UAPs and has long been at work trying to reverse-engineer them. Not only that, the government recovered “[nonhuman biologics](https://rollcall.com/2023/07/26/whistleblower-at-uap-hearing-claims-non-human-remains/)” and has been aware of “non-human” activity [since the 1930s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSjCtwQONyQ). Astonishing claims—so where to begin? Rep. Glenn Grothman, (R, Wis.), chairman of the panel, tried humor. “Welcome to the most exciting subcommittee in Congress this week,” [he said](https://oversight.house.gov/release/grothman-lack-of-transparency-on-uaps-has-eroded-public-trust%EF%BF%BC/). But there wasn’t a lot of laughter after that, especially as Grusch’s testimony unfolded and holes—often gaping ones—appeared in his sourcing. He was told of the crash-retrieval and reverse-engineering project in the course of his work leading the task force on UAP sightings, but he was “denied access” to the actual program. He faced retaliation even before the hearings when he spoke publicly about his discoveries, but provided no details on what that retaliation involved. He claimed to know of “multiple colleagues” who were injured by UAP activities but again offered no specifics. To provide more information than he already had, he claimed, would reveal classified information. As my colleague Nik Popli reported, the military was quick to jump on Grusch’s allegations. To date, said Pentagon spokeswoman Sue Gough in a [statement](https://time.com/6298287/congress-ufo-hearing/) to TIME, the Department of Defense (DoD) “has not discovered any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently. The Department is fully committed to openness and accountability to the American people…DoD is also committed to timely and thorough reporting to Congress." That doesn’t mean the 650 sightings of UAPs don’t bear looking into—especially, many lawmakers and military personnel argue, if they represent advanced military technology deployed by adversarial nations like Russia or China. “If UAP are foreign drones, it is an urgent national security problem,” testified U.S. Navy fighter pilot Ryan Graves at yesterday’s hearing. Graves said he once encountered a UAP off the coast of Virginia Beach during a training exercise. “If it is something else, it is an issue for science.” And science is where things get awfully tricky—especially when it comes to how and why E.T. would be coming to our particular spot in the universe. There are up to [400 billion stars](https://asd.gsfc.nasa.gov/blueshift/index.php/2015/07/22/how-many-stars-in-the-milky-way/) in the Milky Way—[virtually every one of which](https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/faq/7/where-are-exoplanets/#:~:text=Astronomers%20think%20that%20nearly%20every,%2C%20and%20most%20likely%2C%20several.) is circled by at least one planet, and many by multiple planets like our own solar system. Our galaxy is about [100,000 light years across](https://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/features/cosmic/milkyway%5Finfo.html#:~:text=The%20Milky%20Way%20is%20about,Arm%20of%20the%20Milky%20Way.); a single light year is [just shy of 9 trillion km](https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/light-year/en/#:~:text=A%20light%2Dyear%20is%20the,miles%20%289%20trillion%20km%29.) (6 trillion mi.). Unless Einstein is wrong—and he hasn’t been yet—nothing can exceed light speed, and merely approaching it would take an astonishing degree of technological achievement. Now take all of those figures and multiply them by two trillion—or the number of galaxies that [observations by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope](https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/hubble-reveals-observable-universe-contains-10-times-more-galaxies-than-previously-thought) have estimated are in the universe. That makes for an awful lot of planets and an awful lot of cosmic real estate for a visiting spacecraft to cover just to come to our little world. Perhaps our planet is of particular interest to an exceedingly intelligent civilization because we ourselves are a form of intelligent life. But the only signs of that intelligence would be the radio, TV, and other electromagnetic transmissions we’ve been beaming into space since [the first radio signal was sent](https://public.wsu.edu/~bryan.mclaughlin/Radio/Who%5FInvented%5FRadio.html) in 1895\. Those signals travel at light speed, meaning that even in 2023, no civilization outside of a cosmic envelope of 128 light years—awfully close to home—would know we’re here. Maybe such smart cosmic neighbors do exist. Maybe they’ve actually managed to cook up near-light speed technology. Maybe they’ve indeed been visiting us since the 1930s. Maybe the government does know all about it, and—never mind the inveterate leakiness of Washington intelligence—has managed to keep a near-perfect secret for close to a century. Line up all of those maybes—improbable as each one is—and maybe Grusch has a compelling story to tell. But science [tends to prefer simple answers](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Occams-razor), because they’re the ones that are usually correct. We may not yet have an explanation for what UAPs are—and we should indeed be investigating the question. But we ought to have a pretty good hunch about what they’re not. ## Transcript [00:00] Hope you got. [00:02] Let the record show that all. [00:07] Democrats and Republicans in Congress can come together [00:10] in a bipartisan way to cut them. [00:13] I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade, [00:18] UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program [00:23] To which I was denied access to those additional read ons when [00:26] I requested it. [00:29] I made the decision based on the data. [00:31] I collected to report this information to my Superior superiors [00:36] and multiple Inspector General and in effect becoming a whistleblower [00:39] as you know, I've suffered retaliation for my decision but I am [00:45] hopeful that my actions will ultimately lead to positive [00:48] outcome of increased transparency. [00:50] Have you faced any retaliation or apply for any of your testimony or [00:55] anything on these lines? [00:57] Have to be careful what I say in detail because there is an open, [01:02] a whistleblower reprisal investigation on my behalf and I don't [01:05] want to compromise that investigation by providing anything [01:09] that may help provide somebody information, but it was very [01:14] brutal and very unfortunate. [01:16] Some of the tactics. [01:17] They used to hurt me, both professionally. [01:21] And personally, to be quite Frank, I take it, [01:23] that you're arguing, what we need is real transparency [01:26] in reporting system, so we can get Clarity on what's going [01:30] on out there because there are many pilots in your situation [01:33] but we should have a way of developing a system. [01:38] Systemic inventory of all of such encounters is that right? [01:42] Yes. And I think we need both transparency. [01:44] And the reporting we have the reporting, [01:45] but we need to make sure that information could be promulgated [01:47] to commercial, Aviation as well as the rest of populist. [01:55] Well, it's only been about two months or so. [01:57] So I guess my experience has been overwhelming support from [02:01] former colleagues of mine that have been privately messaged [02:04] me and and I do appreciate that, [02:06] but I do have knowledge of [02:10] Active plan, the reprisal, activity against myself and other [02:14] colleagues. And it's very upsetting to me coming from where [02:18] Certain senior leadership at previous agencies associated [02:22] with. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/"},"headline":"What We Know—and Don't Know—About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing","datePublished":"2023-07-27T18:57:52.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-19T07:25:26.706Z","description":"A day of hearings on Capitol Hill yield a lot of sensational claims—and not a lot of science.","url":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/","keywords":["Space","healthscienceclimate"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3414e72d5fa2c38d/698a32b6b3fce34dbc0c9578/UFO-department-of-defense-footage.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jeffrey Kluger","jobTitle":"Editor at Large","url":"https://time.com/author/jeffrey-kluger/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3414e72d5fa2c38d/698a32b6b3fce34dbc0c9578/UFO-department-of-defense-footage.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"UFO-department-of-defense-footage","caption":"The gimbal: an unidentified anomalous phenomenon (UAP) seen through the windscreen of a U.S. Navy fighter jet in 2015.","creditText":"Department of Defense","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/space/","name":"Space"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/","name":"What We Know—and Don't Know—About UFOs After the Congressional Hearing"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Whistleblower Tells Congress U.S. Is Concealing Program That Captures UFOs","description":"A former intelligence official testified at a U.S. House subcommittee hearing, and claimed that the government has been covering up a longstanding defense program that collects and reverse engineers unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and has found \"nonhuman biologics\" at alleged UFO crash sites.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/QxxRUOHn/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2023-07-26T21:50:45.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/QxxRUOHn.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/","duration":"PT2M23S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/6298958/ufos-congressional-hearing-what-to-know/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```