Obama says aliens are 'real.' Congress has heard about UFOs for years

• Former President Barack Obama seemingly confirmed aliens were real in a podcast before he later walked back the comment.
• Congress has held multiple hearings on UAPs, with witnesses testifying about advanced craft and alleged government secrecy.
• A recent hearing featured whistleblower video of a U.S. drone failing to shoot down a mysterious “orb.”
• The Pentagon and NASA have both stated they have found no evidence that UAPs are extraterrestrial in origin.

Former U.S. President Barack Obama ignited a firestorm over the weekend when he joined a popular left-leaning podcast host and seemingly admitted that aliens were "real."

In an interivew with Brian Tyler Cohen published Saturday, Feb. 14, Obama appeared to confirm the existence of extraterrestrials during a lightning round in which he responded with brief answers to quick questions. Though it was a short comment in a nearly hourlong interview, the soundbite quickly became a source of international media buzz.

By the next day, Obama went into damage control mode on social media, clarifying that his answer was simply in "the spirit of the speed round," and that the chances Earth has been visited by aliens from space is "low." What's more, he claimed he saw "no evidence" of them while president.

But despite Obama's shift to downplay the initial comment, the topic of extraterrestrials is hardly a new one among elected U.S. officials – though a former president weighing in is notable. Congress has on three occasions since 2023 convened to hear testimony from a wide array of experts and insiders on reports of UFOs, which have since been rebranded as the less-stigmatized "unidentified anomalous phenomena," or UAP.

Here's a quick recap of what Obama said about aliens, as well as what witnesses have testified on the topic before Congress.

Obama says aliens are 'real' in podcast interview

Aliens became a very brief discussion topic when Obama appeared Feb. 14 on a podcast with Cohen, who asked the former president about extraterrestrials as part of a lightning round of questions.

Asked "are aliens real?" Obama answered: "They're real, but I haven't seen them."

He added that, to his knowledge, extraterrestrials are not being kept at Area 51, a highly classified U.S. Air Force facility in Nevada that has become ingrained in UFO conspiracy theory lore.

"There’s no underground facility, unless there’s this enormous conspiracy, and they hid it from the president of the United States," Obama continued.

Cohen did not ask any follow-up questions on the topic, but Obama shared a post Feb. 15 on Instagram walking back his comments.

"Statistically, the universe is so vast that the odds are good there’s life out there," Obama conceded in the post on Instagram. "But the distances between solar systems are so great that the chances we’ve been visited by aliens is low, and I saw no evidence during my presidency that extraterrestrials have made contact with us. Really!"

Congress hears testimony about UFOs

Obama's seeming admission comes about five months since a slate of witnesses last testified under oath to Congress about strange flying craft they claim can outmaneuver U.S. military vehicles.

The four witnesses who testified Sept. 9, 2025, discussed their own first-hand experiences of seeing what they believed were UAP, as well as their knowledge of what the federal government may be unlawfully shielding from lawmakers about the phenomena.

The hearing was the third in as many years in the halls of Congress since fiery testimony in July 2023 reignited public fascination in UFOs – as well as the possibility that extraterrestrial are piloting them. Across the three hearings, several witnesses – including journalists and high-ranking military members – have testified about shadowy military programs to retrieve and study not only interstellar alien spacecraft, but the extraterrestrial pilots themselves.

The hearings have often spurred calls from advocates and lawmakers alike for transparency. Legislation is in the works that would compel the federal government to release more information about what has been uncovered.

Whistleblower video shows US missile fired at UAP

One of the highlights of the September hearing was the release of a never-before-seen video purporting to show a U.S. military drone trying – and failing – to shoot down a mysterious object.

Provided by a whistleblower to Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Missouri, the video was said to have been taken Oct. 30, 2024, off the coast of Yemen. Burlison referred to the object as an "orb" during the hearing and said it was being tracked by an MQ-9 drone, also known as a Reaper.

In the video, a second MQ-9 drone off screen fires a Hellfire missile that enters from the left side to make contact with the object, Burlison said at the hearing. While the mysterious craft appears damaged as smaller debris breaks off, it is able to continue on its original course after the direct hit.

Witnesses at the hearing, who included three military veterans, testified to Congress that no known human technology is believed to be capable of surviving a direct hit from a Hellfire missile.

Pentagon office denies UFOs are extraterrestrial

The hearing included discussion of what the Pentagon has – and may not have – disclosed about UAP and the Department of Defense's relatively new All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, tasked with investigating sightings.

Many sightings AARO has historically investigated are reported by military fighter pilots, some of whom have captured footage on jets' cockpit gun cameras of UAP. But so far, the agency has repeatedly denied finding any evidence that the craft were extraterrestrial in nature.

NASA similarly put out a report of its own in September 2023, stating that the agency had not found any evidence that UAP were extraterrestrial in nature, though officials did advocate for further study of the phenomenon.

Contributing: Kate Perez, USA TODAY

Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at [email protected]