LIVE: New Jersey Leaders Give Update on Unidentified Drone Sightings

But through the United States, Chris Smith has diligently performed the duties of a congressman. My honor to introduce congressman Chris Smith. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mayor Voss. Thank you for your leadership here. This is your home and your town. You do a wonderful job and I want to thank you for that leadership. I'll give very brief opening remarks and then go to our two sheriffs. We have a number of other mayors and members of the assembly and state senate here and county commissioners, all who say a few words or two because everyone has been really standing up and doing their level best to try to mitigate what we consider to be a very considerable danger. On the large number of drones flying through New Jersey and elsewhere that have so far evaded identification, origin, mission, or potential threat to Americans, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas shockingly said this week, we haven't seen anything unusual we know of no threat, close quote. What the massive invasion of drones observed and recorded by so many of our citizens, including and especially law enforcement and military personnel, many who are here, is it unusual? Is he kidding? How does Secretary Mayorkas, who infamously told us for years that our southern border was secure and closed when we know it's not, and now insult our intelligence that we haven't seen anything unusual? This is usual? I don't think so. And how can he and others like National Security Spokesman Admiral John Kirby say we know there's no threat? How do they know that? What aren't they revealing? Are they just saying it? How can anyone speculate or issue assurances to thousands, millions of Americans who have witnessed thousands who have witnessed the drones that there is no threat? For weeks, we've asked for the truth and action to mitigate any and all threats to people and property. Now we are demanding it. As the sightings increase, including by service members at Naval Weapons Station Earl, and I did talk to the commander there, his men are seeing it right there at the base. Are you kidding me? A munitions depot of that caliber and these drones are hovering in close proximity to it? The Coast Guard told me the other day, and Sheriff Mastronardi, that one of its 47-foot rescue boats was followed in very close proximity off its stern by numerous drones. Why can't we bag at least one of these drones and get to the bottom of it? Why can't we even track them? I asked Secretary Mayorkas at a briefing, a Zoom briefing, why we can't follow them, find out where they're going. They're coming from somewhere. Okay, you can't seem to do that. Why can't we follow them and find what their origin is? Many of them seem to be coming from the ocean. One, I was with Sheriff Mastronardi the other day on the beach, and we saw a video and we talked to one, heard her, one of his deputies talk about how she had seen 50 of them coming from the ocean to mainland. Is there something out there? We don't have the capability to do that. We don't have control over our airspace. And just remember, ladies and gentlemen, the feckless response to the Chinese Communist Party's spy balloon. When that thing traversed America, it went over one very sensitive base, including the B-2 bombers base, after another. We did nothing except say, oh, it's a spy balloon. Or is it? Or is it a weather balloon? I still can't get over that one. The elusive maneuvering of these drones, I would suggest, suggests a major military power sophistication that begs the question whether they have been deployed to test our defense capabilities, or worse, by violent dictatorships, perhaps maybe Russia or China or Iran or North Korea. I mean, they have the capability. And they certainly have the motive. The Pentagon has said the drones are not ours. I've written Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin asking the Pentagon to authorize the use of force to down one or more of these unmanned threats to uncover the mystery. Bring them down over the ocean, over an area where there's no population. Bring them down and find out who's doing it. Knowing that drone warfare has radically changed warfighting in Ukraine and Russia, the Middle East and elsewhere, this is not the time to trivialize or dismiss the threat. I want to express the profound thanks that I and my colleagues have to both Ocean County Sheriff Mike Mastronardi and Monmouth County Sheriff Sean Golden for doing all within their power and authority to aggressively investigate and track drone appearances. They are doing an amazing job. As many of you know, state and local law enforcement is precluded by law from taking more decisive action, which is why DOD must. They are the ones who have the ability and the authority to act. Congress, yes. And the need to move quickly to expand state and local authorities' powers. But DOD has it right now. Sheriff Golden wrote me a few days ago requesting legislation to empower the state police to seriously protect at-risk persons and infrastructure, and if necessary, bring down a dangerous drone or drones. I am now drafting that bill and will soon introduce it. I want to thank him for that idea. I'd like to now yield the floor to Sheriff Mastronardi and then to Sean Golden. Sure. Thank you, Congressman. I just want to clarify a couple of things that have happened. We have a very robust drone program in Ocean County. We've had it for eight years or more. We're very fortunate. It's headed by Sergeant Fennessey. When we started to get these reports at the 911 center from local PDs, we went out and we decided to do a drone patrol, more or less. And we took our tethered drone, which you see over here, that the officers are demonstrating, and we put it up in the air on Saturday night a week ago. At that time, Sergeant Fennessey, who's an experienced drone operator and pilot, and Officer D'Amico spotted one of the items that brought us concern. They videotaped it. As far as they were, they got some tape on it. They described it as going around their drone and traveling off at a high rate of speed and reported to us that it was, they felt it was 60 miles an hour or more. And put it in perspective, our drones only go about 40 miles an hour. So that's number one. Sunday night, we were out again. This time it was Sergeant Fennessey once again. And at that point, we got notified by our 911 center there was concern of a sighting in Island Beach State Park. We responded. We met a officer, a certified New Jersey officer, not from our department, from another agency. And that officer did an excellent job. She documented. That's where you're getting the reports of 50 drones coming off the ocean. That's what she reported seeing. She was on duty at the time, and she reports that she saw 50 drones coming from the ocean to the mainland, transversing the airways over Island Beach State Park, going down towards Barnigan Light and coming to the seaside area. As a result of that, we continue to operate. We obviously notified all of our partners, FBI, State Police, Coast Guard. Coast Guard, Cutter, put out a boat at Barnigan Light, and they reported to us what the Congress referred to the comments. I have not spoke to the people on that boat directly. So what are we doing? We're taking proactive, working with Sheriff Golden, our partner, also Sheriff Nolan, Cape May County, and Sheriff Donahue from Atlanta County. We're taking some, trying to document what's happening, if there's anything happening off the coast of New Jersey. But, you know, obviously there's a lot of tension to this matter throughout. Social media is a little bit different than it used to be when I first came on the job. So that's something you have to control too, because people are putting everything out there. We were looking at the time that we, the Sergeant Fennessy reported seeing a drone. We have flight radar mapping capabilities, and we did not see anything on indicating it was a plane. We get numerous reports of planes. On the other side of the coin, we get people reporting drones when we look right at the radar and say, no, that's a plane going over your house. And then they want to argue with you and say, no, no, no. So just so you know, the flight path to JFK out here, what we see is that they're traveling about 18 to 20,000 feet in the air. And coming out of Newark, going south in the western part of the county, they're about the same, 18 to 20 going south. The ones coming from the islands that are going to land at Newark come over our county at about 6,000 feet. These drones are less than 1,000. So obviously they want us to know they're there. They put on their lights. So who it is, I wish I could tell you. We don't know. We keep telling everybody says, well, it's the government. I don't know, but I think the government has a responsibility, in my opinion, that if it is them, just tell us and we'll be happy about it. But if it isn't, we got to get some answers. So we continue. We see a lot of activity out here. We see other agencies now paying attention to Jersey, thanks to Congressman, his support. So hopefully we'll continue to get some answers in a short period of time. In the meantime, I can assure the residents of Ocean County, working with my partners in Monmouth, Ocean, Atlanta County, that we'll do all we can to document and see what we have out there and address. We have teams that go out from our CSI unit when we get reports to try to document. We had an officer out. We have some special camera lenses that we're looking at that they're up there and trying to convince the homeowners that, yeah, that's a planet. You're okay. So some of it's difficult on the other side. So we want to make sure we're just fair, reasonable, and let's deal with just the facts. Thank you very much. Sheriff Golden. Thank you, Sheriff Mastronardi. And I want to thank Congressman Smith for your tireless effort. When your constituents have a problem in Monmouth and Ocean County, Congressman Smith is always there and we have a problem, right? We have a number of reports that had occurred over a month ago in North Jersey, has worked its way down to Monmouth and Ocean County, continues night after night to be a problem and an issue for our residents. And as the Congressman said, our own military personnel from two different locations, Picatinny Arsenal and Naval Weapons Station Earl, as well as numerous first responders and public safety people have identified these objects in the air. So for Washington to just shun off those type of issues and say it's all planes, right, is not good enough. And I know Congressman Smith has taken it to it. I want to thank though Colonel Callahan and the New Jersey State Police and our Office of Homeland Security Preparedness here in New Jersey because they're doing all they can with the limited amount of technology and limited resources to monitor the situation, to provide real-time dashboards and data to all of the counties involved. And I think they're doing a fantastic job in doing so. But again, they're limited. Part of our conversations with Congressman Smith early on, as he knows, was we need to have our legislation keep pace with the laws and the operation of drones. It has not, right. We know that the FAA and the federal government is solely in charge of the airways and the drone operations as we see it today. We're calling upon Congress, and Congressman Smith is leading the way, to modify legislation so that not just three federal agencies are able to have drone detection and de-drone equipment, right, to be able to put that hands in the state policing units around the country. This is a national public safety and security issue, right. If they aren't foreign drones, then it is a state public safety issue. In order for the state to react, state policing units from around the country will need new technology to detect drones, recreational or commercial. They will need laws that assist them and be able to de-drone, right. That means if we have large-scale gatherings that don't involve our federal partners, we must be able to monitor any of those drone actions above those gatherings and take action, right. And the only way to do that is to change the federal laws that we see today, to keep up with the technology, and to make sure that those laws keep up with the pace of growth and deployments. We have drone delivery systems going commercially. We see Amazon and Walmart, all of our corporations, right, expanding for drone technology. But what we don't see are the laws and rules and regulations to keep up with that. That's why in my letter transmitted to Congressman Smith, it had several points. One of those points in there, commercial or retail regulation, all have to show up on some type of map so that our first responders know that they're there. It can't be voluntary. It can't be an app that, you know, a private organization in airware has made up. It's very useful. It's good. But it's not coming off the FAA radar. So the FAA has to step up. They have to integrate that technology for drone detection into the FAA maps that we see today. Not only that, we have to continue and press upon the fact that our federal government right now, because of those laws, as Congressman knows, is the only way that we're going to get resolved to these issues today. They're the only ones that have the technology. They're only ones that have the law. And they're the only ones that can come in here and identify the sources. Because again, at the state level, county and local, we don't have that tech. We don't have the authority to even take one of these down. And until that change happens in Congress, we rely on the federal government. So for the hundreds of reports and the hundreds of sightings with trained personnel, for the federal government to just shun this away is unreasonable, quite frankly unacceptable. And I know Congressman Smith is working on it. I know our Governor Murphy had transmitted a letter to the White House just yesterday, asking for more resources so that we can get to some solution or resolve to these sightings. Now, to our residents out there, there is some fear and apprehension. Let me say this. We mentioned FlightAware or AirAware and FlightRadar24. You should download them. If you're looking up in the sky and you think you see something, go to the app, see if there's anything available before you contact us. We are getting a lot of false calls in. Here's what I would recommend. Number one, do not call 911. It's not an emergency unless you see one of these things crash, right? That would be an emergency. Please don't call 911. Notify your local police department via the non-emergency landline. They will get to it. They'll record it. They will send it up to the county sheriffs. We will record it and certainly we'll send that to our state homeland security by way of SARS, our suspicious activity reporting system. That's number one. Number two, there's been a lot of talk about shooting these things down. I want to say this. As a resident or a gun owner lawful, please do not do so. A discharge of firearms in those kind of zones, you will be breaking many state laws and certainly we just discovered and just discussed the federal laws that you would be breaking in trying to take down a drone. So please don't do that. Third, if you see one or you see a line, I don't know that you should call 911. I mean make the notification to the local law enforcement. In other words, could those be planes in the approach path to our neighboring airports? Certainly. But when you see several, as we had reports of last night and the night before, five or six weaving in and out at a low altitude, that would be the time to notify us locally and at the county level so we can investigate a little bit further. I want to thank the public for their cooperation in those steps, right, and keeping everybody safe. Again, I want to thank Sheriff Mastronardi working together with our drone units and our technology. We continue to monitor those different reportings that we are receiving. Still in a flurry last night in Monmouth County and we'll continue to monitor that. And I want to thank Congressman Smith yet again for stepping up, bringing attention to the matter, trying to bring federal resources to bear so that we can resolve or get to the bottom of this issue. We're going to turn it over to Mayor. I think we're going to turn it over to the Mayor, John Peterson. Thank you. I am in the back, but I thank Congressman Smith, thank Sheriff Mastronardi, our neighboring Sheriff Goldman, all of whom have joined together at our meeting in Seaside Park just the Thursday one back, December 5th. Our residents reported seeing such drones and that was the night, if you recall, the winds were howling here along the coast, 35 to 50 mile an hour gusts. There is no way, absolutely, that these were any hobbyist drones. They were something far above and beyond that. These issues are very, very concerning and the response from the federal government is very, very insulting. And I thank all of my colleagues here standing together. We're demanding answers. It's for our safety, it's for our well-being, and it's the responsibility of the federal government so far, which has fallen on nearly deaf ears. So thank you all. Thank Mayor Vaz as well and Chief Boyd next door, all keeping us safe. We have every level of government here from the, you met two of the mayors, we have county commissioners including Tom Arnone, who is the director of the county commissioners in Monmouth County. Ginny Haynes is here. If they would, any of our distinguished leaders who are here would like to say a word or two and then we'll go to questions. Hi everyone, I'm Vicki Flynn, the state assemblywoman from District 13. I first, on behalf of the state, would love to thank the law enforcement personnel here. The sheriffs in Ocean and Monmouth are exceptional. I think everyone trusts that they're doing everything that they can to make sure that they're going to get to the bottom of it and keep everyone safe. I would also like to thank Congressman Smith for his leadership in making sure that we get whatever legislative changes needed to address this issue. On behalf, I'm sure the other legislators would like to speak, but I know on this week we vote in Trenton. All the state legislators will be down there on Thursday and I can't think of a more important issue than the one right now facing New Jersey is this drone issue. I know Governor Murphy issued a letter asking for support from the president and we are going to do the same in the legislature. I know the Republicans are drafting a resolution. I'm hoping we will have bipartisan support, asking for immediate federal funding, federal support, so that this is not left on the shoulders of the local sheriffs, local law enforcement, and our state police. We need more federal intervention because this is definitely a federal issue that is being unaddressed. So I just wanted to make sure everyone understood that. That will be introduced probably Monday and hopefully on Thursday we will be voting on this issue. I don't know if any of my other state legislators would like to speak on that. I'll just say a couple of words. Ocean County Commissioner Frank Sedaghi. As the congressman indicated, I think the biggest disappointment here is the fact that we rely on the federal government to protect us. That's one of the main things that they're supposed to do and they have failed us. We've been talking about this for three weeks. When I have a young father who called me two nights ago crying because he has kids in the elementary school in Island Heights, my hometown, and he doesn't know if the kids should be in the lockdown mode during the times where they see something in the sky. This is affecting our citizens every day, every night, and this has to stop. The federal government has to stand up to their responsibility and protect our citizens. Thank you. So first of all, Commissioner Director Tom Arno, Monmouth County. Just on behalf of Chris Smith, I have to personally thank him because over and over I see time and time again when issues come up, concerning issues come up, alarming issues come up, the one congressman that steps up and I want to personally thank you congressman for that. I also want to thank our sheriffs because you know the average person does not see what's going on behind closed doors and and this collaboration between the two counties there to work together for the safety of the of the people there. But at the end of the day this is a federal issue that's being put down on on the people that are on the ground roots right here. But you know if half of the hard work and the discussions that could be done and I hope they're being done on the federal level that we watch and I'm sure the commissioners here in Ocean County and myself see what our sheriffs are doing here. We need to have that message put out. We need to have the message put out that this is their responsibility to get the message out to put safety to people in their mind that they're safe here. So on behalf of I'm sure Ocean County and myself we want to thank our sheriffs and most importantly we want to thank our congressman. to threats posed by potentially hostile drones. As I said before you know warfare has been radically changed and we just look at what happens each and every day in the Ukrainian war and how our own ships have been under attack in the Middle East by drones and missiles. These things are lethal and we don't know if these are but why don't we know and so that's why we're all saying and I'm glad Sheriff Golden made that very strong point. We can't take actions into our own hands and shoot one of them down. We have a military that has that capability and that capability resides as close as the joint base. I have spoken to the the commanding officer there the CO who told me they had that capability. Well we need to deploy it and that comes from the top. The Pentagon needs to authorize that and in terms of the other ideas they all should be on the table to determine whether or not that might mitigate threat and allow us to see more clearly what is up there so there's no confusion. One of the aspects of the bill that Sean Goldman asked me to put in a provision is all about de-confliction so we know exactly what we're looking at when we're looking at it and there's protocols in place for that as well but it's an idea that needs to be pursued and again so much clutter of these you know are a risk to aviation. We know that the mere presence of birds both my brothers are pilots. One was an a7 fighter pilot on the Enterprise. The other brother is a helicopter. Cobra is he flew everything fixed wing but especially for the jets birds pose a very very real risk if they are obviously are subsumed or go into the engines. What about all these drones? You know we need to be very careful about what that might do to aviation and the safety of it so we we're here this is the wake-up call. You know we've had a month of not action. You know I was amazed when Secretary Mayorkas when he briefed us and that us means the New Jersey delegation and the governor put that together he didn't have a clue and I said Houston we have a problem and that's why we're all trying to stand up and for the two sheriffs to do the leadership or provide the leadership that they're providing we need that kind of can-do attitude in Washington and at the Pentagon so good points and we need to follow up on those. Yes yes well it would be a combination in that the state police would get the empowerment to really have what Homeland Security should have what DOD currently does have and that is the ability to track and bring down one of these drones. Again they could be so hostile you know we get the World Cup and we got Super Bowls we have all of these other events drones pose a very significant danger we're going to call the Pentagon and say look how quickly they've responded to any of this and so we need to stand up that authority and again that was Sean's idea and I really appreciate that he suggested that and we're going to push it hard you know we have a very good chairman of the Homeland Security Mark Green he's a very effective guy and and there was just a hearing a week ago by two of his subcommittees and I was at it as was Jeff Andrew and Congresswoman Melia Takis and we all spoke out on these issues and Jeff by the way couldn't be here he has a good statement I hope you'll all take a look at it because he cares deeply as well but that's what it would do but other law enforcement would get more training more resources would be given to local law enforcement because this is a threat this you know think of it as trespassing from the air you know and when you think about a military base like Earl having these incursions over their airspace I talked to the commander there the captain Captain Smith there was one right there at Earl and there's been several that was 150 feet away from his people they took pictures of it so you know this is this is I mean munitions same way with Picatinny that's a real problem as well so that's what it would do and I do have with me a list of the exceptions that would be needed to overcome in current law there are several of them again that precludes local law enforcement from being as proactive as we want them to be but especially the state police. Thank you so very much for coming out. Yes.