House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on Wednesday rebuffed the Biden-Harris administration’s response to recent drone sightings in New Jersey, decrying how federal authorities have given no clear answers to Congress on their origin.
In a Fox News appearance, Johnson agreed that the White House, and more broadly the U.S. government, does not seem concerned about the increased sightings in New Jersey and elsewhere in the Northeast.
“Look, I’m the speaker of the House. I have the exact same frustrations that you do and all of us do. We don’t have the answers. The administration is not providing them,” Johnson said.
Johnson said he set up a meeting last week with officials from the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security and the FBI, and “the answers are not forthcoming.”
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Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA), left, speaks as House Majority Leader Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) listens during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 17, 2024 in Washington, D.C. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
“They just say ‘don’t worry about it, it’s not foreign entities, there’s not a vessel offshore doing this, and they’re not collecting any data.’ OK, then what is it?” Johnson said.
“You heard Mayorkas, who no one believes, we impeached him in the House as you know, the DHS secretary, he said in an interview a couple days ago, well because they changed the regulations to allow drones to fly at night, that’s why everybody’s seeing them now. They’ve always been there. I mean, look, people are not buying the answers,” Johnson said. “We are digging in further to get the answers, and we’re demanding that the administration do its job. We gotta protect Americans, protect our intelligence, of course, and our data and everything else. We’re going to get down to the bottom of it, but we don’t have the answers yet.”
Johnson referenced how Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told ABC News on Monday that there are thousands of drones flown every day in the U.S., and that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in September 2023 “changed the rules so that drones could fly at night, and that may be one of the reasons why now people are seeing more drones than they did before, especially from dawn until dusk.”
Mayorkas also said it was “critical” for Congress to expand authorities for state and local agencies to counter drone activity “under federal supervision.”
Johnson reacted to President Biden telling reporters at the White House on Tuesday that there was “nothing nefarious” happening with the drones, and that so far, there has been “no sense of danger.”
“This is why we need Donald J. Trump back in the White House to bring steady hands at the wheel and a strong commander-in-chief,” Johnson said. “He would have already had the answers, he would have already delivered to the American people and certainly to members of Congress. So leadership matters. That’s why he got the mandate. That’s why the American people can’t wait for the America First agenda to start, and we can’t wait either.”
Federal authorities said Monday evening that the reported drone sightings have been identified as legal commercial drones, hobbyist drones and law enforcement drones, as well as manned aircraft, helicopters and even stars. Officials said that assessment was based on technical data and tips.
A drone is seen over Ridge, New York, on Thursday evening on Dec. 12, 2024. (Grant Parpan/Newsday RM via Getty Images)
The House Intelligence Committee grilled federal law enforcement and intelligence officials about the drones during a closed-door meeting on Tuesday, Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., told CNN.
Authorities told the panel there still is no evidence of public safety or national security threats, Himes said.
Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy said Monday that drone-detection equipment supplied by the federal government has yielded little new information. He declined to describe the equipment, except to say it was powerful and could even disable the drones, though he said that is not legal on U.S. soil. Murphy urged Congress to give states more authority to deal with the drones.
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Meanwhile, the FBI and New Jersey state police warned against pointing lasers at suspected drones, because aircraft pilots are being hit in the eyes more often. Authorities also said they are concerned people might fire weapons at manned aircraft that they have mistaken for drones.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Monday that the federal government has yet to identify any public safety or national security risks from any of the reported drone sightings in the northeast, saying officials believe they were lawfully flown drones, planes or stars.
“There are more than 1 million drones that are lawfully registered with the Federal Aviation Administration here in the United States,” Kirby said. “And there are thousands of commercial, hobbyist and law enforcement drones that are lawfully in the sky on any given day. That is the ecosystem that we are dealing with.”
The federal government has deployed personnel and advanced technology to investigate the reports in New Jersey and other states, and is evaluating each tip reported by citizens, he said.
A social media user said she filmed several drones hovering over Fairfield, Connecticut, on Thursday night. (Lucy Biggers)
About 100 of the more than 5,000 drone sightings reported to the FBI in recent weeks were deemed credible enough to warrant more investigation, according to a joint statement by DHS, FBI, FAA and the Department of Defense.
Speculation has raged online, with some expressing concerns that the drones could be part of a nefarious plot by foreign agents.
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Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said it Is unlikely the drones are engaged in intelligence gathering, given how loud and bright they are. He repeated Tuesday that the drones being reported are not being operated by the Department of Defense. When asked whether military contractors might be operating drones in the New Jersey area, Ryder rebuffed the notion, saying there are “no military operations, no military drone or experiment operations in this corridor.”
Ryder said additional drone-detecting technology was being moved to some military installations, including the Picatinny Arsenal and at Naval Weapons Station Earle in New Jersey, where drones also have been reported.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.