WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump said U.S. government officials, including President Joe Biden, know where the mysterious drone sightings along the East Coast are coming and going from, accusing the leaders without evidence of intentionally keeping those details from the public.
Trump said the U.S. military also knows where the drones took off and where they went afterward. “And for some reason, they don’t want to comment,” he said Monday at a wide-ranging news conference at his private club Mar-a-Lago. “And I think they’d be better off saying what it is. Our military knows. And our president knows. And for some reason, they want to keep people in suspense.”
“I can’t imagine it’s the enemy, because if it was the enemy, they’d blast it out. Even if they were late, they’d blast it,” he added. “Something strange is going on. For some reason they don’t want to tell the people, and they should.”
Trump’s remarks drew a quick pushback from the White House, where national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters during a call that the U.S. government was not withholding critical information from the public.
“We are making a very good faith effort to be as open and direct with all of you and with the American people … as we can and that will continue,” he said. “There’s absolutely no effort to be anything other than as upfront as we can be.”
“I recognize that some of the criticism over the last few days has been that we … haven’t said more of what we know,” Kirby added. “That’s because we didn’t, we didn’t have as much information as we do now, after a few more days of extra resources, extra personnel, extra analysis.”
Federal authorities have tried to reassure residents that the objects don’t appear to be operating nefariously. The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security have said such sightings mostly appear to be not drones at all. Kirby said that there are more than one million lawfully-registered drones in the U.S., thousands of which are flying around on any given day.
“We have not identified anything anomalous or any national security or public safety risk over the civilian airspace in New Jersey or other states in the northeast,” he said Monday, crediting law enforcement officials.
At his press conference, the president-elect said he was reconsidering visiting his Bedminster, New Jersey, club as a result of the nearby sightings. “I think maybe I won’t spend the weekend in Bedminster,” Trump said from his Florida club with a smile. “I’ve decided to cancel my trip.”
Trump declined to say whether he’d received an intelligence briefing on the sightings, and it was not clear from his remarks if he had direct knowledge of the origins of the strange lights in the sky, which have been spotted in New Jersey and New York.
He previously said in a social media post that he did not think drones could be flying over the U.S. without the federal government’s knowledge. He said the Biden administration should tell the public more information or “shoot them down.”
The lights in the sky were first spotted in New Jersey in November. The sightings have continued for nearly a month, prompting concern from elected officials. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul called on Congress on Saturday to enact stricter drone oversight. The Biden administration had previously asked Congress to take action.
Kirby said last week that despite using “sophisticated electronic detection technologies provided by federal authorities,” that neither federal nor local officials had not been able to “corroborate any of the reported visual sightings.”
U.S. officials have repeatedly said since they do not have any evidence to suggest the drones are being operated by a foreign government or present a danger to Americans.
The Department of Defense told reporters on a Saturday call that the U.S. does not have intelligence or observations that would suggest any drones that have flown over military bases recently are associated with a foreign power. However, the department said it can not be certain, partly because personnel have to coordinate with local and federal officials to track them down.
“It is our job to be vigilant,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said Sunday on ABC News. “If there is any reason for concern, if we identify any foreign involvement or criminal activity we will communicate with the American public accordingly. Right now we are not aware of any.”
Contributing: Jeanine Santucci
