As Defense turns its attention to anti-drone measures, activists are calling for a new UFO declassification law

While a bill to force the US administration to disclose information on UAPs has been stalled for two years, Defense has been slow to address the threat posed by swarms of advanced platforms

THIS ARTICLE WAS MADE POSSIBLE WITH CONTRIBUTIONS FROM OUR PARTNER ASK A POL.

The deadline for unveiling the first drafts of the defense funding bill is fast approaching, and this is usually used by activists as a means of pushing their legislation through Congress.

Initial behind-the-scenes discussions are now concluding, and activist groups are seeking to mobilize public opinion in support of their preferred strategy, despite previous failures.

Since 2023, an initial bill seeking to establish a declassification council on UFOs under the president’s authority has failed to pass in its entirety, despite the support of prominent representatives and senators. Currently, the National Archives can request that the administration send its documents relating to UAPs, but this depends on the goodwill of the various agencies.

There have been many reasons put forward for censoring this bill, but they often fall into the realm of defamation because they are not based on any evidence. However, it could be hypothesized that the presence of Eminent Domain over UAP debris, which would enable the US government to recover property by force from both private companies and individuals, including scientists, could cause tension for many people.

In this context, Sean Munger — a lawyer and former US Marine Corps intelligence analyst — has proposed the UAP Registration Act. Under this act, owners of debris would simply have to report it to the authorities. Confiscation would not be possible, and the declassification committee would not be appointed by the executive branch, thus avoiding a transparency issue. The RA would also permit the inspection of recovered items without questioning ownership, except in cases of non-reporting. The RA's disclosure part is significant in itself:

Congress finds and declares the following: (1) Private and government entities within the United States possess technologies and biological materials of non-human intelligence (NHI) origin.

However, this does not seem to be to everyone's liking. One is a group of activists calling themselves the 'New Paradigm Institute' that is dedicated to :

achieving UAP disclosure in order to unite the human family, deconstruct unjust social and economic structures across our planet, gain the benefits of extraterrestrial technology, and restore living biosystems as we take our place in a galactic civilization.

As it launches its third call for support for a UAP law in the 2026 defense funding bill, Kevin Wright, 'Press Relations Manager & Policy Liaison' for the NPI, published a white paper on 19 June attacking the RA head-on :

The UAPRA, despite its pragmatic veneer, entrenches executive opacity by evading the unconstitutional secrecy surrounding NHI, UAP, and TUO. It relies on the AARO without independent oversight, offers no whistleblower protections, and lacks enforceable disclosure mechanisms. Conversely, the UAPDA establishes a transformative framework through its independent URRB, Controlled Disclosure Campaign Plan, and eminent domain authority. While the UAPRA’s registration process may appeal to some, it fails to address systemic secrecy.

Commenting on the NPI's text, Sean Munger exclusively told Sentinel News:

Their analysis is a outright misrepresentation of UAPRA, to say the least, it’s a mischaracterization of what I wrote. NPI’s critique omits multiple sections of UAPRA in order for their conclusion to be correct.

Some may be surprised by these debates, which have been sparked by the publication of articles, while at the same time the group is calling for support for its own text:

Tell Congress: Pass the UAP Disclosure Act

For more than 75 years, the U.S. government has concealed information about Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP), keeping Congress, scientists, and the public in the dark. But that era of secrecy can end—if Congress passes the Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Disclosure Act (UAPDA).

@SenatorRounds (R-SD) will soon reintroduce the UAPDA. Now is the time to demand transparency, accountability, oversight, and answers.

The UAPDA will launch a government-wide review and declassification effort, empowering Congress and the public to finally understand what has been hidden for decades.

Senator Mike Rounds recently spoke to Matt Laslo, journalist for Sentinel News’ partner ASK A POL. As one of the bill's architect, he had already indicated in mid-February that Trump administration appointments had delayed its introduction. In mid-March, he learned of the creation of the House committee on the declassification of federal secrets and responded with some irony, saying, 'You want people busy.' Similarly, in early May, he expressed surprise at the declassification committee's recent awareness of an FBI group dealing with UAPs. On 10 June, he was unsurprised to learn that the Air Force had fabricated fake UFO recovery programs:

I will tell you that our Intel and our Armed Services are very good at finding cover stories.

And using cover stories — and I think even Project Blue Book

indicated that some of those reports out there, may have very well been to cover the work that we were doing on stealth and some other projects as well.

On 18 June, he provided further clarification, confirming what many experts on the subject have explained over the past two weeks.

there was no surprise in the discussion of it. I thought that was pretty well common knowledge that that had been going on for years.

On 10 June, he even mentioned the testimonies he had heard:

I've talked to a lot of people that don't want to go public because of the stigma that comes with, you know, the idea that if they talk about something which is, you know, which doesn't have a good explanation to it, that they're basically seen as not being all there.

If they felt that there was a place where they could go to make the reports, but also for individuals who may have — because of their official capacity — information that could help us explain some of these phenomenon, that they knew that there was a place where they were expected to make that report to a central filing location

Regarding the declassification law, he was more reserved:

I'm open to it. Look, I just think we'd be better off if we made sure that individuals that may have information regarding, you know, their own knowledge of things that were simply unexplainable.

When asked about the wave of drones that blocked the Langley base, Senator Rounds replied:

I think it's fair to say that they were not attributing where they were coming from, but I think there's a high probability that they know where they were coming from now

We're developing the anti-drone systems. There's a number of them that are usable. Some of them are — you can use in the United States because they're not kinetic in nature

We've come a long way in terms of our electronic warfare capabilities as well. So yeah, if we know that something's gonna go on, or if we have one deployed in a location, we can be pretty effective against them

They have the authorities right now to protect the bases and those sensitive properties. They have that capability now. They have the authorization now.

When Matt Laslo asked him on 18 June about the meaning of the term 'non-human intelligence' used in the bill, the senator confirmed that he was not referring to a new generation of artificial intelligence.

Matt Laslo explained that there is an overlap in meaning for elected officials between UAPs and drones, as both are detected by the same tools and present similar problems.

Evidence of this shift towards counter UAS was recently provided by Tim Philips, former acting director of AARO, who stated:

It’s going to be in the 2025 Defense Authorization Act, they're actually going to mandate, it's going to be part of the law that AARO will be a “must coordinate office” when it comes to counter UAS, operation, activities and solutions. So AARO is part of that community often, when we detect something that shouldn't be there, often we resolve that as a UAS. Well if we detect that, we need to pass that to that commander that they have an issue at their location, AARO is not the UAS place, we're looking for UAPs.

In this context, Senator Gillibrand's intervention in front of the new Secretary of Defense, Hegseth, during the 2026 Defense Department Budget Request was particularly noteworthy:

I'm concerned about our posture with regard to UAS and a defensive posture with regard to UAS attacks. I am very concerned about what happened over many of our military sites. Drone configurations hovering for weeks without response. No authorities to be able to track where those drones came from by the DOD to assess are they Iranian, are they Chinese, are they Russian, are they on spy missions, what is their purpose. Inadequate authorities, inadequate defenses, inadequate technology. The Langley incursion is incomprehensible.

The Secretary of Defense replied:

On counter UAS, which you mentioned, it is, I mean, it is a reality of the modern battlefield, whether it's in Ukraine or elsewhere, that we have to fully account for and address as aggressively as possible. And I can, you have my assurances that the highest levels we are putting our best people in charge of ensuring we have counter UAS systems that can match the threats of the future.

These responses were not sufficient for Senator Gillibrand, who then asked the Secretary of Defense to provide written answers:

What is your plan for increased authorities, increased investment, appropriate review of UAS that hover over our military and nuclear sites? So this committee has a fulsome response from your whole team about how you will address these two problems.

The same Secretary of Defense had responded to questions from Fox News on the subject on May 20 in a more than evasive manner:

Will Cain, Fox News:

I sat with you on a couch when you asked then I believe former NSA director John Ratcliffe a former CIA now CIA director you asked him are aliens real now you're in here in all of these classified rooms and briefings so what is going on at area 51

Pete Hegseth, Sec Def:

I don't know. I can't tell you. I did sit privately with director Radcliffe at the CIA and we were, our two agencies are collaborating more than they've ever had before. But if I told you that, we'll have to kill you. You're in a bad spot for that.

The reporter was referring to statements made by former Director of National Intelligence and current CIA Director John Ratcliffe on March 19, 2021:

When we talk about sightings, we're talking about objects that have been seen by Navy or Air Force pilots or have been picked up by satellite imagery that, frankly, engage in actions that are difficult to explain, that movements that are hard to replicate, that we don't have the technology for.

Although some activists are campaigning for the subject to be demilitarized, the fact remains that unauthorized platforms in airspace and strategic areas present a real problem, especially if they are capable of disabling nuclear missiles or preventing the deployment of interceptors.

Scientific research on this subject can be conducted independently of the military. Similarly, the military can conduct interceptions and investigations independently of scientists, much to their chagrin.

However, in modern democracies, politicians must represent both the interests of the nation and those who elected them. This dichotomy largely explains the back-and-forth between conservatism and progress that characterizes the organized chaos of democratic functioning, which has been hijacked by both private lobby groups and activist groups.

It is hoped that these mixtures of genres will not end up like the cycles of discovery, legitimization, resistance, extremism and discrediting (DiLRED), that have occurred many times in the field of PAN studies since 1947. However, public debates initiated without consultation between parties in activists groups, which are closely monitored by defense agencies, do not present an encouraging picture. The formation of a social group centered on leading figures where questioning is forbidden under threat of ostracism is seemingly another indication of the radicalization of illogical thinking influenced by herd instinct.

The emergence of figures calling for the mobilization of interested citizens in the coming days is one of the foundations of democracy. However, if the same text is rejected a third time, can questions about its arguments and the reasons for the resistance they provoke be raised?