Transcript: Briefing to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities - Open Hearing: April 19, 2023

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1 Senator Gillibrand: Great.
2 Mr. Kirkpatrick: What I would ask, though, is as you
3 all continue to refer to us and refer witnesses to us I
4 would appreciate if you do that. Please try to prioritize
5 the ones that you want to do because we do have a small
6 research staff dealing with that.
7 Senator Gillibrand: Thank you. And then do you have
8 any plans for public engagement that you want to share now
9 that you think it is important that the public knows what
10 the plan is?
11 Mr. Kirkpatrick: So we have a number of public
12 engagement recommendations, according to our strategic plan.
13 All of those have been submitted for approval. They have to
14 be approved by USDINS. We are waiting for approval to go do
15 that.
16 Senator Gillibrand: Okay. I will follow up on that.
17 And then my last question is about the integration of
18 department's UAP operations, research, analysis, and
19 strategic communications. During the recent UAP incidents
20 over North America it did not appear that you were allowed
21 to play that role.
22 Do you agree that the public perception is generally
23 that you and your office did not appear to play a major role
24 in the department's response to the detection of objects
25 over North America?