It’s shocking how little information the U.S. government has told the American people about the UFOs that we targeted over the weekend, and Senator Mike Lee — who recently attended a briefing about it all — agrees. He joins Glenn to explain why that Senate briefing was so ‘frustrating’ and he questions why these objects were destroyed in the first place. Plus, Glenn and Sen. Lee theorize another possibility behind the federal government's focus on the UFOs: Are they a DISTRACTION or a DECOY away from recent rumors about the U.S.' possible involvement in the Nord Stream Pipeline’s destruction? Because if that's true, Glenn says, we’re heading down a ‘very dark road…’

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: We go to Senator Mike Lee. Hello, Senator, how are you, sir?

MIKE: Doing great, thank you very much, Glenn.

GLENN: I want to give you a couple of headlines.

US intercepts four Russian war planes yesterday, near Alaska.

The next headline.

US warns, it will defend the Philippines, after Chinese laser was shot at their Coast Guard.
Let's see here. Norway warns of growing importance of Russian nuclear deterrent. China's President Xi conveyed his support yesterday, for Iran, during a visit from the first visit from the Iranian Prime Minister.

We are -- we are not in good shape.

Do you and members of the intelligence committee, have any idea, what's going on?


MIKE: Well, we know some things are going on. We know certain things are happening. There's a whole lot we don't know. And in particular, there's a whole lot we don't know about the so-called objects, brought down by fighter jets, firing missiles over the weekend.

That was the focus of yesterday's classified briefing.

GLENN: Okay. So, Mike, we hear balloons. We hear that they now -- the Pentagon came out yesterday, after your briefing and said, you know what, it's nothing. These are probably just commercial balloons. But we have the Canadians sending out the HazMat teams, to look for this, and we hear this morning, that they are UAPs. Which I guess could be balloons. But usually, those are, you know, something solid. These were the size of cars.

And they weren't balloons. They were metal.

Is that true?

MIKE: Yeah. So, first of all, we don't really know what they are. I don't know how they claim now, to know what their nature is. Whether they're commercial, military, or from some other origin.

Because they haven't found them. I -- I suspected at this point, that they're theorizing on what it might be. That is what was so frustrating yesterday, they held this classified briefing, to tell us what happened.

And they showed us, to tell us basically what had happened. We had all hoped and expected, based on public statements, that they had covered what was left of these objects.

And that they were studying them. They hadn't found them, at least as of yesterday, when they briefed us. They hadn't found them. Because we don't really know what they are.

GLENN: I don't know what you can and can't say. Come on. We launched missiles. We know we have the video from the cockpits. We know that.

MIKE: Yeah. We repeatedly asked them about that activity. Show us anything about documentation of video footage, anything like that. They said, yeah. We have some that aren't really useful. The object is so small. So far away.

That the resolution doesn't really do anything for us.

GLENN: And why would we shoot them down?

MIKE: It's an excellent question. So we shot them down, not knowing what they were, just based on their altitude. We just knew that they were there.

But I -- I still can't fathom why it made sense to scramble fighter jets, shoot missiles at them.

Bring them down. When we have no idea, what they are.

GLENN: Okay.

MIKE: They're apparently not that concerned about it. Or else, they would be frantic. And they're not that.

GLENN: Okay. We found out last night, that the United States government had been tracking that Chinese balloon, for over a week. Once it was launched from China, we locked on to it, and tracked it. Did they tell you that yesterday?

MIKE: There are things in there, that I probably shouldn't repeat, from what I know. But it's -- it's safe to say, that we did know, before this thing hit the United States, that it was in the air.

We were aware of it. And we knew what was happening.

And so at that moment, it really should have brought the thing down. And at whatever moment they -- they realized, that it was coming on to the United States. And that it had the ability to collect data, they should have brought it down.

We kept hearing last week, about the fact that, well, been safe, to bring it down to the United States.

Nonsense.

GLENN: Bullcrap.

MIKE: Even at 60,000 feet, these things don't have a glide capacity. They're balloons. So if you puncture the balloon, it will head straight down. Yes, there is a debris field. But there's a lot of space, between Alaska. Off the coast of Alaska. To be clear.

And the rest of the United States. Where there are miles and miles around them, where there are no people.

And they should have brought it down. Here's what I think, Glenn. What I suspect was, these were makeup calls. They were compensating last weekend, for what they didn't do the previous week. Which is take bold aggressive action. Only, they took bold aggressive action on the wrong objects, at the wrong time.

GLENN: Are we going to know? Do you think we'll ever know this?

MIKE: I certainly hope so. It seems almost unbelievable to me. That we shut down three of these things over the weekend. We didn't cover any of them.

And if there was no immediate threat, as there apparently was -- in the explanation we've heard. Enter space, where aviation happens. You know, okay. Fine.

That's understandable. Sometimes you need to bring things down. But there was no immediate threat.

If that being the case, why can't they use a different kind of aircraft, one that could have surveyed up close, before shooting it down.

You can't really do that. We have a fighter jet, traveling at the speed of sound.

GLENN: Correct. I got to -- it is like our government is being run by, you know, Mrs. Hoffelmeyer's fourth grade class.

It is. I mean, and just the boys.

Because the girls would be a little smarter.

The boys, is just like, let's blow it up out of the sky. This is crazy talk.

There is another possibility here. That they are using this -- whatever it is. That they're using this, to get people off of the Nord Stream pipeline story, from Seymour Hersh.

And I don't know how much you can talk about it, or -- or what. What you know.

But, Mike, I find this extraordinarily concerning. Because there's only a few countries that could do it. None of them really had the incentive, or they would have let us know. If it was another country, would you have gotten a briefing on that?

Do you think, if they would have told us?

MIKE: It's -- it's hard to say.

I -- we don't necessarily get those briefings, just because they feel like it. Usually, it's because a member is asking.

Or because there's been national news about something. And they decide to brief all members. I tell you, I haven't gotten a briefing on this. I'm trying to get one.

All this, of course, goes back to this report published by Journalist Seymour Hersh, last week, indicating that according to his story, there were specialized US Navy teams that planted explosives there. And that the United States was responsible. I don't know whether this is true. I'm trying to ascertain whether it's true.

But I will say this, we need to approach a near peer nuclear-armed geopolitical adversary, with extreme caution.

And so I would like to think, that if we were going to do something like this, this would be some kind of clear authorization from Congress.

You, the chief executive. The president of the United States, commander-in-chief doesn't have the ability to take us to war.

I don't think it's a stretch to say, that doing this, not just to Russia -- a nuclear arms near geopolitical adversaries.

GLENN: All of Europe.

MIKE: It's also an attack on France and on Germany, and it affects a lot of Europe.

It's also an attack on France and Germany, and it affects a lot of Germany. I would like to think, it gets congressional authorization of some sort, before doing that.

GLENN: Well, he said, that there was a way around that. Because obviously, they should have done that, if we were involved.

I just don't believe that we -- that all of the allies, with all of our technology, and everything else.

We can't figure out, okay.

It looks like it's probably these people. I -- I personally, because they're so zipped up about it. It's got to come from the West. And the only ones that can do it really, are France and us. Or Great Britain.

And those guys won't do it. But, you know, you look at -- you look at this, Mike.

And if -- even if that's not true, can we find out if anything is true? As far as, there's these secret SEAL teams, that can be trained off the books, so Congress doesn't know about it?

MIKE: Yeah. Look, I think there are a lot of details, at least enough details, in the Seymour Hersh piece. That there should be fairly amenable for being proven or disproven.

Because either certain things match up, or they don't. It may be easier to disprove than to prove. But I think that can get us a lot of the way there. And there are a lot of others that could have done it. In theory, it could be China. Perhaps China wanted to make sure it had access to more of Russia's natural gas, and that it could get it at a lower price. In theory, it could have been China.

But -- and there are a handful of others, who there could have been. But this is worrisome for me, Glenn. For the simple reason.

Look, I don't know Seymour Hersh. I'm not familiar with any of the facts, alleged in his report.

But there are a couple of things that worry. Number one, on February 9th, 2022. President Biden during a press conference, said that if -- if Russia attacks Ukraine, that there will no longer be a Nord Stream two.

The journalists who had asked him the questions, about what he meant, was doing her job. And followed up with, what do you mean by that?

That pipeline is not under our control. And he reassured her. Believe me, we have the means to do it. And it will be done.

It will not exist.

GLENN: Well, what --

MIKE: So when you cut the fact with the fact that in this country, we have for a long time, seen overreaches from the executives, to the point where a lot of people accept now, that in the name of a clandestine operation, the United States can effectively wage war with them -- an act of Congress, authoring it. That really does concern me.

Not that I'm certain, that we did this. Because it's certainly not. It's not that I could verify the Hersh article. I can't. It really troubles me, that I can't really rule it out.

GLENN: And you can't get a briefing on it. All right. Hang on just a second.

Because when we come back, I want to ask you, do we want to know.

Stu and I were talking about this, this morning. And we were like, you know, the blue pill might be the one to take on this.

MIKE: Uh-huh.

GLENN: Because this is an impeachable. Maybe worse. It's an act of war.

It's -- I don't know anybody that is going to fight against Russia, because -- if they attack us. Because we -- we blew up the pipeline. Europe -- I mean, the world will hate us.

And it means war. So I don't know -- do we want to know? And we'll come back with Mike Lee for that answer in a minute.

If pain is a part of your life, you may have got to the point, where you believe, you have to take it lying down, sometimes literally.

I'm here to tell you, I understand that. Because I was right at the point, where I'm just going to lay down.

Thank God I have a wife, that is -- woman. She gets tired of listening me gripe about things. Because I gripe about a lot of stuff.

But if it wasn't for her, I might never have tried Relief Factor and got it my life back. Listen, please. Please. Just try it.

If it doesn't work, yes, you're out $20. But $20. What is that? If you can get your life back. 70 percent of the people who try it, find the relief. And go on to order, month after month. So please, just try it. I didn't believe it would work for me either.

ReliefFactor.com. ReliefFactor.com. Or call 800-4-Relief. 800-4-Relief. 19.95. ReliefFactor.com.

Feel the difference.

Ten-second station ID.
(music)

GLENN: All right. Mike Lee. Do we want to know?

MIKE: Look, I think the American people do deserve to be in charge with their government.

GLENN: I agree with that.

MIKE: It's very much a mixed bag. Because as you alluded to before the break, the answer to this question, it turns out the United States was responsible, has very dire consequences.

And I don't -- I'm not even talking yet about what happens within our government.

What the consequences there might be.

GLENN: Is this -- does this rise -- does this rise to more than an impeachable offense.

MIKE: Quite possibly, yes.

I believe it does.

Because if you go to such great lengths, to engage in an attack. A provocative offensive attack, on a a nuclear armed geopolitical adversary, and you do so in a manner that violates our Constitution.

Because that's how I see it anyway. It seems to me like an act of war, last I checked.

War can't be just declared, just decided by our president.

And sure, I know clandestine operations have. Discreet military strikes are something different, than something provocative on this scale. That inevitably lead to and, in fact, are war.

GLENN: Yeah. So if we would find out, that this is even a real possibility, what happens?

What do we do?

How do we tell our allies? How do we tell Russia, so we can kind of -- before we say, I'm going to tell you something. But you have to promise not to be mad.

I mean, we've got to -- you know, in that case. Yeah. We have to promos, that you're not going to launch a nuclear strike.

How do we tell them this?

MIKE: I -- I don't know.

That's part of what makes this such a difficult thing.

But one thing I do know is that ignorance is never something that will put us in a position of strength.

I do think it's important if we get answers on this. I -- I would like to know.

And -- and whether we end up finding out or not, whether this thing is buried so far, so deep by the military intelligence industrial complex in Washington, that we can't get to it. Whether we find out or not, whether we did it or not, I think it's very important for us to have this national conversation.

GLENN: It is.

MIKE: Because for decades, we've seen this gradual accretion of power, within the executive branch, when it comes to the war powers.

And increasingly, Glenn, the way wars are fought these days, they don't typically have soldiers lined up in a battlefield, in corresponding parallel columns.

No. You've got -- you've got stuff like this. This is war.

In the 21st century.

And so we need to have a national conversation about the fact, that today, as -- at the time of the founding, we need our greatest, the people's representatives, to make the decision about going to war.

And clandestine operations need to be reined in to something truly discreet. This one wasn't.

GLENN: Mike Lee, thank you so much for everything you're doing.

And we pray for you. And we'll keep you in our prayers for your safety. As you continue to go down this road.

Thank you. You bet. Buh-bye.

Do you want to know?

It's like

it's almost as if, if we don't -- if it did happen. And we don't expose it. Then we get what we deserve.

STU: Yeah. I mean, of course, I want to know.

But there's that feeling of -- you know, of course, Russia knows, if our media is starting to know. Then Russia knows too. The question is: If it becomes public. And it becomes obvious to everybody. Then Russia has to respond to -- to do something for their own people.

GLENN: They have to.

STU: And that response, even if it is, you know --

GLENN: But maybe the people can temper our response to theirs.

STU: Right.

GLENN: You know what I mean?

Like, okay. We deserve that.

STU: It's a dark road though.

GLENN: It's a very dark road. Very dark road.

STU: Look, the blue pill was the right one to take. Just take the freaking blue pill, get along with everyone else.