Vice President JD Vance discussed his views on UFOs in a new interview with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson on Friday.
Newsweek reached out to Vance’s office for additional comment via email.
Why It Matters
The possibility of extraterrestrial life has captivated the American public for decades, and President Donald Trump said in February he would order the release of documents related to alien and extraterrestrial life, as well as unidentified flying objects (UFOs). Governments have never confirmed the existence of extraterrestrial life, but debate about its possibility continues.
What to Know
In an interview on The Benny Show Friday, Vance said he was “obsessed” with the UFO filings when he came into office but has ended up getting “really busy worrying about the economy and national security and things like that.” He pledged to “get to the bottom of the UFO files” over the remainder of his time in office.
“I’m obsessed with this,” Vance said. “I’ve already had a couple of times where I’m like, all right, we’re going to Area 51, we’re going out to New Mexico. We’re going to sort of get to the bottom of this. And then the timing of the trip just didn’t work out. But trust me, anybody who’s curious about this, I’m more curious than anybody. And I’ve got three years of the very tippy top of the classification. I’m going to get to the bottom of it.”
He continued to explain his beliefs about UFOs and why he thinks they’re “demons.”
“Celestial beings who fly around, who do weird things to people, I think that the desire to describe everything celestial, everything as otherworldly—to describe it as aliens. I mean, every great world religion, including Christianity, the one that I believe in, has understood that there are weird things out there, and there are things that are very difficult to explain,” he said.
He continued that when he hears about any sort of “extra natural phenomenon,” he goes to the Christian understanding that there is “a lot of good out there, but there’s also some evil out there.”
One of the “devil’s great tricks” is to convince people he “never existed,” Vance added.
Earlier in March, the Trump administration registered the federal domain Aliens.gov, fueling interest in aliens.
Do Most Americans Believe in Aliens? What Polls Show
A YouGov poll from September 2024 found that a majority of Americans—53 percent—believe aliens definitely or probably exist. That poll surveyed 1,135 adults and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points
A Pew Research Center poll from 2021 found that 65 percent of Americans believe in intelligent life on other planets, while 34 percent do not. Fifty-one percent of Americans believe unidentified flying objects (UFOs) spotted by people in the military are either “definitely” or “probably” evidence of intelligent life outside of Earth, according to the poll.
Scientists have not ruled out the possibility of extraterrestrial life. In September 2025, NASA’s Perseverance rover uncovered rocks in an ancient river that scientists believe could hold clues to microscopic life that may have lived on the planet. Still, there has been no conclusive evidence of alien life.
What People Are Saying
Trump wrote to Truth Social in February: “Based on the tremendous interest shown, I will be directing the Secretary of War, and other relevant Departments and Agencies, to begin the process of identifying and releasing Government files related to alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs).”
Elon Musk discussed aliens during a discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in January: “We have 9,000 satellites up there, and not once have had to maneuver around an alien spaceship. I don’t know. Bottom line is, we need to assume that life and consciousness is extremely rare, and it might only be us. If that’s the case, then we need to do everything possible to ensure the light of consciousness is not extinguished.”
Representative Anna Paulina Luna, Florida Republican, to podcaster Joe Rogan in 2025: “Based on the photos that I’ve seen, I’m very confident that there’s things out there that have not been created by mankind.”
What Happens Next
More information about when UFO files may be released remained unclear.
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