Representative Tim Burchett, a leading advocate for government transparency around UFOs, said that he has been briefed on some “pretty wild” things and said he thinks the American public “can handle it.”
The Tennessee Republican called for government agencies to declassify sensitive information while appearing on The Big Weekend Show on Fox News on Sunday.
Why It Matters
Burchett’s comments are the latest instance of him calling for the declassification of information regarding unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), or UFOs.
He has repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that the U.S. government has recovered UFO technology and possibly even extraterrestrial beings, and has alleged a decades-long cover-up.
The congressman’s latest comments come after President Donald Trump said in February he would order the release of documents related to alien and extraterrestrial life, UAP and UFOs.
What To Know
Near the end of his appearance on Fox’s The Big Weekend Show, co-host Tomi Lahren asked Burchett if he wanted to talk about UFOs.
“I’ll talk about aliens,” Burchett said. “Look, it’s not about little green men, it’s not about flying saucers, it’s about what are we spending tens of millions of your dollars on—when some alphabet agency tells me they don’t exist and then again another department within that department tells me they do exist.”
Burchett has long expressed skepticism of the military intelligence establishment and argued that taxpayers have a right to know about clandestine programs involving extraterrestrial technology.
He spearheaded the landmark 2023 House Oversight hearings on UAP sightings and recovered crafts, and championed the UAP Transparency Act, which mandates the release of relevant documents and strengthened whistleblower protections for reporting unidentified phenomena.
In his comments on Fox News on Sunday, Burchett repeatedly hinted at classified information he has seen about extraterrestrial life.
“I have some ideas about what it is, I’ve been briefed on some things and yeah, they’re pretty—they’re pretty wild. And I think America needs to know that stuff, and we need to know what the heck we’re spending the money on to study,” he said.
The Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office maintains that there is no credible evidence of a secret reverse-engineering program, and attributes most sightings to terrestrial objects or optical illusions.
What People Are Saying
Representative Tim Burchett said on The Big Weekend Show on Fox News: “Just tell the American public. It’s like I told President Trump—peel back the layers of that onion, let America decide if we can handle it. I think we can handle it.”
What Happens Next
Burchett will likely continue campaigning for transparency. It is unclear when government agencies will release government files relating to UAPs and UFOs, per Trump’s February directive.