Rep. Tim Burchett said the House of Representatives is holding a hearing on UFOs because people deserve to kno. Pic credit: NewsNation/YouTube
The House Oversight Committee has tentatively scheduled the long-awaited hearing on UFOs for late July, Politico is reporting.
The planned hearing is the culmination of efforts by a group of members of the House of Representatives advocating for greater openness after the whistleblower David Grusch made allegations about secret UFO retrieval programs.
Rep. Tim Burchett: This is about aliens; people deserve to know
A spokesperson for Rep. James Comer, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, reportedly confirmed the news. The source said a subcommittee hearing would likely happen in the last week of July.
Representatives Tim Burchett from Tennessee and Anna Paulina Luna from Florida are heading the subcommittee tasked with organizing the hearing.
“That’s what it is about–aliens,” Burchett reportedly said. “I think people deserve to know.”
The DoD opposed the plan
Opposition to the planned hearing came from some members of the House Oversight Committee and the Department of Defense (DoD), Burchett told Politico.
A Republican committee member admitted that some of their colleagues did not want it. However, the faction that wanted it prevailed.
Those who opposed it argued it was not the right time and feared that “people will run wild with it.”
However, a staffer denied claims about divisions within the committee on holding the hearing and said they were working on a list of the witnesses to invite.
Grusch’s claims sparked public interest in UFOs
NewsNation reported that Rep. James Comer admitted that whistleblower allegations that the government concealed information about UFOs increased interest in the subject.
He said the committee was planning a hearing for the last week of July.
He also confirmed that Reps. Tim Burchett and Anna Paulina Luna were heading the subcommittee tasked with organizing the hearing.
Comer added that the pair was in charge because they were passionate about the issue.
UFOs of non-human origin a threat to national security
Paranormal Papers previously reported that Burchett raised the alarm that UFOs of non-human origin intruding into U.S. airspace was an issue that should concern every American.
“We have something that we do not control in our military airspace,” he told the Washington Examiner.
He alleged that the U.S. government has been covering up information about UFOs since the 1947 Roswell UFO incident or the 1897 Aurora UFO incident.
He said his team was working on a shortlist of people to appear as witnesses. He added that people opposed to the hearing would likely question the credibility of some of the witnesses.
Increase in UFO sightings
The development comes amid a reported increase in UFO sightings.
Paranormal Papers reported that the Office of the Directorate of National Intelligence (ODNI) noted in its 2022 Annual Report on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs/UFOs) that there was an increase in the number of reported sightings.
The preliminary assessment covering the preceding 17 years included 144 sightings.
But after the period covered in the preliminary assessment, an additional 119 newly discovered cases and 247 new reports brought the total to 510 as of August 30, 2022.