Claim · E-041
Luis Elizondo: Answers “yes” under oath to the question of whether the government has conducted secret programs to retrieve crashed UAP, and “yes” to the question of whether they served to identify and reverse engineer alien craft; he agrees with David Grusch on the existence of a decades-long retrieval and reverse engineering program.
Luis Elizondo · Nov 13, 2024 · Joint hearing of two subcommittees of the House Oversight Committee, “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth” (November 13, 2024) – answers to Mace and Burchett (Hearing)
Under oath Hearsay Legacy program and recoveries
Disputed
The sworn testimony conflicts with the official conclusions of AARO and the DoD, which state that they found no evidence of these programs, and Elizondo did not indicate the basis of his knowledge, citing a document that prohibits him from discussing it.
- In support
- David Grusch stated the same under oath in 2023, based on hearsay; Jay Stratton (2025–2026) says he saw non-human craft and beings; no evidence has been made public. Stratton is an executive producer, with Elizondo, of The Age of Disclosure and in October 2026 published the book “Out of the Shadows,” from which a television series is in development (The Debrief, September 24, 2026).
- Against or denials
- AARO (March 2024) has no evidence for the reverse engineering narrative and attributes it to circular reporting from a small group of people; the DoD (2023) has no verifiable information on possession or reverse engineering programs; the AARO FY2025 report (July 2026) again rejects the claims about possession of recovered material; the WSJ investigation of June 2025 described false briefings on a reverse engineering program (“Yankee Blue”) given to commanders of classified Air Force programs, a possible origin of sincere but mistaken beliefs.
Sources
- Transcript of the hearing “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth”, House of Representatives, November 13, 2024 (primary source)
- AARO, Report on the Historical Record of U.S. Government Involvement with UAP, Vol. 1, March 8, 2024 (The Black Vault copy) (primary source)
- NPR – Grusch's hearing and the DoD's position, July 27, 2023 (press)
- Wikipedia – “Yankee Blue” (cross-reference) (other)
- The Debrief, la storia di Jay Stratton diventa una serie televisiva (24/9/2026) (press, pro-disclosure)
- Skeptic (Michael Shermer), review of “The Age of Disclosure” (November 23, 2025), with the caption on the executive producers (analysis, skeptical)
On this site
People 1
Claims 8
- Luis Elizondo: Argues that a secret program for the retrieval of non-human craft has existed for decades, called the… Unverifiable
- Luis Elizondo: Asked whether there had been talk of possessing bodies, he answers “yes” under oath, but specifies that he… Unverifiable
- Luis Elizondo: Claims to have signed about three years earlier, in a SCIF at a Department of Defense facility and in front… Unverifiable
- Luis Elizondo: Calls the first volume of AARO's historical report intentionally dishonest, inaccurate and dangerously… Unverifiable
- Luis Elizondo: Claims under oath that the United States possesses UAP technologies, as do some adversaries, and confirms to… Disputed
- Luis Elizondo: Claims under oath that he believes a secret arms race has been under way for decades, funded with diverted… Disputed
- Luis Elizondo: Writes that he is aware of several episodes in which the U.S. military and some defense companies retrieved… Unverifiable
- Dylan Borland: Claims under oath that, a few years after a triangle sighting at the Langley base in 2012, through an… Unverifiable
Inconsistencies 2
- Luis Elizondo: “Yes” under oath, but based on hearsay
- Luis Elizondo: Bound not to speak about retrievals, but writes about them to Congress
Documents 6
- The Joint Staff's procedures for reporting UAP and handing material over to AARO (May 19, 2023) Original available
- AARO's Historical Record Report, vol. 1 (March 2024) Original available
- The transcript of the November 13, 2024 House hearing with Elizondo, Gallaudet, Shellenberger and Gold Original available
- AARO's Consolidated Annual Report on UAP for Fiscal Year 2025 Original available
- The confidential 1962–64 rules for recovering and analyzing space vehicle fragments Original available
- The State Department “Moon Dust” cables (1973–1978) on the retrieval of fallen space objects Original available
Where the claims come from 2
- The United States holds intact or partially intact craft of non-human origin, the product of a retrieval…
- The reverse engineering of recovered craft has contributed to the development of U.S. aerospace and military…
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UAPgrade's entries are compiled with artificial intelligence (three verifiers with opposing roles) and checked against the sources listed above: how we work. Have a document that changes this entry? Bring it to the Investigations Unit.