Congress is prepared to revisit the topic of UFOs once again in a Wednesday hearing that will be open to the public.
More than a year has passed since U.S. House members last heard testimony about strange craft whizzing through the nation's airspace unchecked, as well as claims about the Pentagon's reticence to divulge much of what it knows. While steps have been made toward transparency, some elected leaders say progress has been stymied by the Department of Defense's reluctance to declassify material on UFOs, which the government now refers to as unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP.)
The upcoming hearing is being jointly held by Nancy Mace (R-South Carolina) and Glenn Grothman (R-Wisconsin,) who was a sponsor behind a bipartisan bill to allow commercial airline pilots to report UAP sightings to the government.
In a press release on the House Oversight Committee's website, the hearing is described as an "attempt to further pull back the curtain on secret UAP research programs conducted by the U.S. government, and undisclosed findings they have yielded."
"The American people are tired of the obfuscation and refusal to release information by the federal government," Mace and Grothman said in a joint statement. "Americans deserve to understand what the government has learned about UAP sightings, and the nature of any potential threats these phenomena pose."
Congress is revisiting UFOs:Here's what's happened since last hearing on extraterrestrials
The hearing will take place at 11:30 a.m. ET Wednesday.
The hearing will be open to the public and press and will be livestreamed on the House Oversight Committee's website.
Watch the hearing below:
Four witnesses are expected to offer testimony Wednesday. They include:
Congressional leaders last heard testimony in July 2023 about unidentified craft flying through U.S. air space in ways military witnesses believed were beyond human technology.
Former Pentagon intelligence official David Grusch also offered sensational testimony about an alleged shadowy "multi-decade" Pentagon program to retrieve and study not only downed spacecraft, but extraterrestrial pilots. Without offering hard evidence, Grusch accused the Pentagon under oath of being aware of extraterrestrial activity since the 1930s and hiding the program from Congress while misappropriating funds to operate it.
While the Pentagon has denied the assertion, its office to investigate UFOs revealed a new website last September in the wake of the hearing where the public can access declassified information about reported sightings.
Later that same month, NASA releasing a long-awaited UFO report declaring that no evidence existed to confirm the extraterrestrial origins of unidentified craft. However, as what Administrator Bill Nelson said was a signal of the agency's transparency, NASA appointed a director of UAP research.
In that time, the hearing has fueled a wave of docuseries, opportunistic marketing campaigns and speculation about UFOs, reigniting a pop culture obsession that first came to focus after the infamous 1947 Roswell incident.
Amid the heightened public interest, legislation has also been targeted at UAP transparency, with one seeking to create a civilian reporting mechanism, and one directing the executive branch to declassify certain records.
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Eric Lagatta covers breaking and trending news for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected]
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