White House Denies Trump Has Alien Speech as UFO Debate Intensifies
By Jim Thomas | Wednesday, 18 February 2026 05:56 PM EST
Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law, stated on the “Pod Force One” podcast that she and her husband, Eric Trump, had previously asked President Donald Trump about UFOs and aliens.
The White House confirmed Wednesday it had not heard of such a statement. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the idea “news to me,” adding she would consult the speech-writing team and noted the topic would be of interest to her personally and former President Barack Obama.
Leavitt’s reference to Obama followed recent attention after he joked about aliens during a rapid-fire segment on Brian Tyler Cohen’s podcast. Obama later stated he had seen no evidence that extraterrestrials have made contact with Earth.
The renewed public focus on UFOs coincides with congressional interest in unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), including a July 2023 House Oversight subcommittee hearing involving former intelligence officer David Grusch and two military pilots.
Grusch testified during that hearing that information about UAP programs was being withheld, a claim the Pentagon disputed and later reviewed by investigators.
In a March 2024 historical report from the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, it found no evidence that the U.S. government or private companies have reverse-engineered extraterrestrial technology or hidden “off-world technology” or extraterrestrial biological material.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
