FLORIDA, USA — U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida says he is taking whistleblower allegations about UFOs "seriously," and that Congress has privately heard from several people with "very high clearances and high positions in our government" who claim to have first-hand knowledge on the subject.
Rubio, who is the Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman, spoke on this during an exclusive interview on NewsNation. The media outlet asked if he believed reports from former intelligence officer David Grusch that the government secretly has alien spacecraft were credible. While Rubio sidestepped answering that question directly, he did say similar reports from other high-ranking officials to Congress are concerning.
He said either the reports are true and parts of the intelligence community are keeping Congress in the dark about dealings and what funds are being used for or the government has "crazy" people in high-ranking positions. Either way, it's a big problem, Rubio told NewsNation.
Grusch, who NewsNation interviewed previously about his claims, is a second-hand witness, according to the media outlet. However, in the interview, Rubio said he and others in Congress have heard similar, first-hand claims about UFOs from some high-ranking government officials.
"I will say that there are people who have come forward to share information with [the intelligence] committee over the last couple of years," Rubio said during the interview. "I would imagine some of them are potentially some of the same people that perhaps [Grusch] is referring to."
"I want to be very protective of these people," Rubio continued. "A lot of these people came even before these [whistleblower] protections were in the law, for whistleblowers to come forward."
Rubio said that many of the people who have come forward privately to Congress are "fearful" of potential consequences of their first-hand claims to their jobs, security clearances, careers and potentially even "harm" coming to them.
When asked again if he finds these claims credible, Rubio had this to say:
"I don't find them either not credible or credible because we have no basis — understand, some of these claims are things that are beyond sort of the realm of what any of us have ever dealt with. What I think we owe them, is just a mature understanding and listening and trying to put all these pieces together and sort of just intake without any pre-judgment or jumping to any conclusions one direction or another."
"I will say I find most of these people — at some point or maybe even currently — have held very high clearances and high positions in our government. So you do ask yourself like what incentive would so many people with that kind of qualification — these are serious people — to come forward and make something up," he continued.
Back in May, NASA held its first public meeting on UFOs a year after launching a study into unexplained sightings and insisted it's not hiding anything. A final report from its team of 16 scientists and other experts assigned to the study is expected in July.