Thread by @TheUfoJoe

1 Q from RBS: "Is recent Congressional interest in #UFOs a distraction, or a real issue worthy of attention?"

(Scattered laughter from crowd. What else is new?)

@RepAdamSchiff: "I love questions about UFOs (crowd laughter). You know, actually, I think that it is of a worthwhile

https://twitter.com/BSquidding/status/1548705087551258624

2 Schiff: "subject of oversight for Congress. And I say that, because...there are things that we just cannot explain. When we...well, first of all, you know, for decades, when pilots would see unexplained aerial phenomenon, they would often not report it because if they 𝘥𝘪𝘥

3 Schiff: "report it, the people thought they were a kook. But they did make some...some did make reports. But the reality is, 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 there was so much stigma attached to reporting things, most things 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯'𝘵 reported & when they 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 reported, there was no

4 Schiff: "follow-up done to find out whether there was any innocent explanation for what they saw. We are now, as a result of oversight, being more systematic when pilots & others 𝘴𝘦𝘦 things they can't explain. And in some of those cases now, where pilots, in particular, have

5 Schiff: "𝘰𝘣𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘦𝘥 aerial phenomenon, we can't explain it. And by that, I mean, it's not just a pilot saying, 'I saw something in the sky,' it's the pilot's 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴, 𝘢𝘭𝘴𝘰 saying, 'There is something 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 that you're seeing.' So there are

6 Schiff: "instruments that are measuring a presence there, so you have multiple confirmation there is something there. And sometimes, that something moves in ways that we simply cannot explain, that aren't consistent with our own technological capabilities, or what we know of

7 Schiff: "our adversaries. And sometimes, they're not even consistent...they don't appear to be consistent with what we know about physics. I think those are 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 intriguing questions. I mean, if they are questions about foreign capabilities, then we need to know the

8 Schiff: "answers. Sometimes, we have been able to go back and kind of reverse engineer the situation, and we 𝘥𝘰 get an explanation. You know, we've learned, for an example, that because of some of the infrared technology and the speed in which the aircraft was traveling in

9 Schiff: "one direction, & the object it's observing is traveling in another direction, that it appears in a certain way in the infrared, or in the other spectrum, that makes it look unexplainable, but actually, 𝘤𝘢𝘯 be explained. So, sometimes, we 𝘢𝘳𝘦 able to confirm what

10 Schiff: "it is, but there are other cases where we can't. There are cases, I think, where we suspect that it 𝘪𝘴 another countries' technology...it may not be a technology that is necessarily well beyond our own, or even beyond our own, but we're not aware of what it is, and

11 Schiff: "we need to 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸 what it is. So yes, I 𝘥𝘰 think it's worth exploring and...if it turns out to be 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 than that, that would be intriguing. My own suspicion is that what we're seeing can be explained if we knew more about what we were observing and how we were

12 Schiff: " observing it, but I leave myself open to other possibilities. You know, I represent the @NASAJPL lab in Pasadena, & it's actually one of the most fun responsibilities of my job, to work with the brilliant people at JPL that put those craft on Mars and in other parts

13 Schiff "of the solar system. And I love the work they do & what they reveal about the Universe, & how often we're 𝘸𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘨 about our assumptions of things. So I don't want 2 exclude the possibility that we are wrong about other things as well."

Glad @BSquidding asked the Q

14 I would have tried to follow up with: There are whispers that members of Congress have met with people who claim to have worked in UFO-related programs and that there is a short line of folks willing to speak/testify about what they did and experienced in said programs. True?