We recently discussed the rather remarkable language contained in a proposed amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) submitted by New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D) and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jack Reed. In the amendment, instructions are given regarding the future collection of data regarding reported sightings of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs, or UFOs for all of you old school folks) as well as the establishment of a permanent office to handle these matters. The Anomaly Surveillance and Resolution Office (ASRO) would coordinate the work of military branches, intelligence agencies and even civilian, scientific resources in this regard.

But while the language in the amendment contained some intriguing phrasing not seen in congressional legislation in the past, it still allowed for the possibility that these unexplained vehicles might be the property of adversarial nations such as China or Russia. The furthest the amendment really went beyond those possibilities was to suggest that we need to explore the “origins, and intentions of unidentified aerial phenomena.” This is the line that most everyone in Congress has been sticking with. Despite the fact that virtually everyone in the debate is now concluding that it’s not our tech and it’s almost certainly not the Russians or the Chinese, that leaves a big question hanging out there. If it’s not tech from the world’s most powerful militaries, that doesn’t leave many other choices, does it? We saw the same approach from the House version of the bill penned by Congressman Ruben Gallego (D-AZ). He too included caveats in case the phenomena were part of some adversarial tech program while allowing that it might be something more “exotic.”

This has left many observers wondering if the next round of legislation or hearings will include the words that every single one of us is already thinking but nobody in the halls of Washington DC has yet to say aloud. Do I really need to spell it out for you? Is someone from Congress or our military finally going to step up to the microphone and say… what if it’s aliens?

Liberation Times points to recent comments made by Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines during a conference at the National Cathedral in Washington. She comes closer than anyone previously, suggesting that as far as our intelligence community goes, yes… ET is on the table as one possibility.

It is then important to assess the importance of what Haines went on to say at the forum. Unexpectedly, Haines added:

“Of course always there’s also the question of ‘is there something else that we do not understand, which might come extraterrestrially.”

This suggests that officials in Washington are currently considering whether UAP reflects non-human intelligence – a term which did not appear in the UAPTF report, although it most likely falls within its ‘other’ bin.

Yes, sports fans. The current Director of National Intelligence sat in front of a camera and said the word “extraterrestrially.”

Seemingly not wanting to be outdone, Congressman Gallego, who previously alluded only to adversarial tech or “something unknown,” gave an interview this week where he seemed to no longer feel unconstrained by the previously unwritten rules. If you watch this brief interview and listen, you’ll note that he says both the word “alien” and “extraterrestrial” no less than four times.

So is this it? Is this the next big step that so many people have been waiting for? It certainly sounds as if the taboo is lifting in the Halls of Congress and inside of our most senior intelligence offices. Some of these craft simply can’t be coming from America, Russia, or China, or at least so it seems. And if it’s not us, then who is it?

Maybe our military doesn’t actually have any definitive proof of extraterrestrial technology squirreled away at Wright-Patterson or someplace else. (Though understandable doubts about that claim are widespread.) Perhaps there’s just nothing that they can or are willing to show us. But maybe it’s time to clear the decks a bit here and some of these members of Congress who are paving the way could relieve a lot of the tension in the room and clear the air if they just came out and said it. You don’t have to say that it’s definitely aliens. (At least not yet.) But how about if you just come out once and for all and say that it might be aliens? Is that really so much to ask? Because we all know that you’re already thinking it.