Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed that the Pentagon is working on President Donald Trump’s directive to declassify files related to unidentified aerial phenomena, more commonly known as UFOs, but said the timeline for the effort remains unclear.
“We’ve got our people working on it right now,” Hegseth said in response to questions from Endless Void Studios founder and former network correspondent Kristin Fisher during a stop on his “Arsenal of Freedom” tour in Colorado. “I don’t want to oversell how much time it will take. We’re digging in. We’re going to be in full compliance with that executive order, eager to provide that for the president. So, there’ll be more coming on that.”
President Donald Trump, in a Truth Social post on Feb. 19, said he would direct his administration to release government files related to UAPs.
Hegseth said the Defense Department (DOD), which has been rebranded as the War Department under the Trump administration, would work alongside the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) on the matter.
“It’ll be a deliberative process. I don’t want to over promise and under deliver. So, we’re going to take a little time to make sure we assess what this should look like and deliver for the president, for the American people,” he said.
Over the past several years, UAP have shifted from a largely speculative topic to one increasingly treated by lawmakers and defense officials as a matter of national security concern.
Public and congressional pressure led to the establishment of the DOD’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) in 2022 under the Biden administration. The office was tasked with documenting, analyzing, and resolving UAP reports using what it describes as a rigorous scientific framework and data-driven approach, in coordination with ODNI and other agencies.
According to AARO’s 2024 report, which covered the period from May 1, 2023, to June 1, 2024, the office received 757 UAP reports during that timeframe. Of those, 485 incidents occurred during the reporting period, while 272 incidents took place between 2021 and 2022 but were not reported to AARO until later and were not included in previous annual reports.
As of June 1, 2024, AARO was reviewing more than 1,600 total cases, the report states. The office has not yet published its 2025 annual report.