In 2006,Donald Trumpwas firing people onThe ApprenticeandDr. Philwas daytime television's reigning tough-love therapist.
Twenty years later, the former is president of the United States, the latter, his informal UFO ambassador—recentlytrusted with unreleased government fileson unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP) to gauge how the public might handle what's inside.
"Here's what comes in stages. First they acknowledge it, then they confirm it's real, then they tell you where it's from," Dr. Philsaidin an August 7 Instagram video discussing UAP disclosure. "And somewhere down that road, maybe, is the big one—the government of the United States standing at a podium and saying out loud, we are not alone."
For most of 2026, a rumor has consumed the world of UFOlogy: President Trump is sitting on a finished speech confirming humanity isn't alone. Whether the “disclosure speech” actually exists is a topic of rabid discussion on X, the r/UFO subreddit, and dozens of extraterrestrial-curious podcasts, but the reasons so many people believe in it are very real. Humans are arguably experiencing the most consequential era for the UFO scene since the ’40s and ’50s, when amysterious crashoutside Roswell, New Mexico, andunexplained radar blipsover Washington, DC, birthed decades of legends of little green men and flying-saucers.
There's no doubt that the government has been engaging with the topic. Secretary of State Marco Rubiorecently confirmedthat Stephen Miller, one of the most powerful figures in the White House, has been handed the UAP portfolio.
Tim Gallaudet, a retired Navy rear admiral who helped run the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration during Trump's first term,testified before Congress about UAPin 2024, and now sits on aUAP Science Advisory Councilreporting to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. He called the increased government interest “a total change in executive-branch transparency from the last 80 years."
But he’s unsure if that would ever culminate in a speech from a sitting president, because they would “have to acknowledge that we're not in control, that we're not the highest level of intelligence on the planet, and that's going to be a very hard thing for any government to admit."
A White House spokesperson tells WIRED via email that “No such speech is planned—rather, the administration continues to release files as they become available, and the public to make up their own minds about the information uncovered.”
For believers, themodern UAP disclosure began in 2017, when a New York Times articlerevealed a secret Pentagon programquietly investigating UAPs. The Pentagon went on to confirm in 2020 thatleaked videos of Navy pilotstracking seemingly impossible objects were real. A 2021 intelligence reportconceded the phenomena existedand remained unexplained, and in 2022 the governmentestablished an official investigation office. Then, from2022to2025, Congress held yearly public hearings where pilots, military officers, and intelligence veterans (including Gallaudet) testified under oath.
What’s also novel is that UAP disclosure has bipartisan support. Both the Housetask force on declassifying federal secretsand theHouse UAP Caucusare made up of legislators from across the aisle.
This year, the drumbeat of government interest turned into a drumroll about a potential Trump speech. In January, filmmaker Mark Christopher Leeclaimed a disclosure speech was imminent, pegged to the 79th anniversary of the alleged Roswell crash on July 8. Few took him seriously.