JUNE 5, 2024: The text of the FY 2025 Intelligence Authorization Act (IAA) (S. 4443), as unanimously approved by the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) on May 22, 2024, was officially filed on June 3, 2024. It contains several provisions that may be of interest to UAP-focused communities.
The main UAP-related material is found in Title X (pages 215-218), consisting of three numbered sections, 1001-1003.
Section 1002 is a technical change of little interest.
Section 1001 requires the Comptroller General to conduct “a review” of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), the Pentagon’s “UFO office.” The Comptroller General is the head of the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which is a support component of Congress, not a part of the Executive Branch.
The GAO review would encompass “implementation by the Office [AARO] of the duties and requirements of” the previously enacted laws that created AARO and gave it certain mandates and missions, “such as the process for operational unidentified anomalous phenomena reporting and coordination with the Department of Defense, the intelligence community, and other departments and agencies of the Federal Government and non-Government entities.”
The GAO review may also include “such other matters relating to the activities of” AARO as the GAO considers appropriate. This might include, for example, review of AARO’s reports on the history of U.S. government involvement in UAP. AARO published a controversial initial historical report in March 2024, and is supposed to issue a final historical report later this month, although it is not clear whether that statutory “deadline” will be met.
The delivery date for the proposed GAO report would be set later by agreement among designated congressional leadership and the Comptroller General.
Section 1003 is not new language. It simply extends through FY 2025 a provision of the enacted FY 2024 IAA law that prohibits funding of Intelligence Community controlled-access programs “involving” UAP “unless the Director of National Intelligence has provided the details of the activity” to the congressional intelligence committees and top congressional leadership. This language was originally proposed in the SSCI in July 2023 by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), co-sponsored by Senators Mike Rounds (R-SD), John Cornyn (R-TX), and Marco Rubio (R-FL).
In many years, but not all, the Intelligence Authorization Act is merged with the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) at a later stage in the legislative process. When this is done, the final votes in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate are on a merged NDAA-IAA, and the two measures are sent to the President as a single bill.
The Senate Armed Services Committee has scheduled voting sessions (called markups) on the Fiscal Year 2025 NDAA on June 12-14, 2024. The House of Representatives is expected to consider amendments to its version of NDAA (H.R. 8070) later this month.
In addition to the UAP provisions described above, Title VIII of the Intelligence Authorization Act (S. 4443) contains 28 pages (pp. 181-208) of proposed new provisions to enhance protections for whistleblowers who are members or former members of the Intelligence Community.
These provisions are associated with Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), who has not been publicly associated with particular interest in UAP. However, some of his proposed changes in law conceivably could have application to some would-be whistleblowers who possess UAP-related information.
The complete PDF of S. 4443, as approved the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on May 22, 2024, can be viewed or downloaded from the link below.
https://www.congress.gov/118/bills/s4443/BILLS-118s4443rs.pdf
submitted by /u/Implacable_Gaze
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