While the roots of the disclosure movement can be traced to the 1940s and the work of
Raymond A. Palmer and
Richard Shaver, In 1955,
The Flying Saucer Conspiracy by
Donald Keyhoe argued for an end to a supposed cover-up. By 1963, Keyhoe, citing conversations with members of Congress, called for "full disclosure of UFO facts" and publicly predicted "some action in a few months", though no major announcement occurred in the ensuing months. In 1977, the US News and World Report published a claim that 'unsettling disclosures' about UFOs would be announced by the CIA before the end of the year; none emerged.
Origins Steven Greer, who claims to have seen a
flying saucer as a child, is widely regarded as a prime influence of the disclosure movement, having popularized the term "disclosure" to refer to advocacy for the end of this perceived cover-up in the early 1990s, and Greer himself identifies as the founder of "the worldwide disclosure movement". In 1993, he established The Disclosure Project which, according to
Religion Dispatches, "encourages the government to disclose the reality of UFOs, as well as advanced technologies like alternative energy that could save the planet". Some persons affiliated with Greer's initiatives practice his "CE-5" protocol which attempts to directly commune with space aliens via
meditation as a means of compelling disclosure, and Greer commercially markets "Ambassador to the Universe" trainings to teach CE-5. On September 27, 2010,
Robert Salas appeared at the
National Press Club in Washington D.C., along with other UFO speakers, where he told a tale of the
Malmstrom UFO incident, where a UFO report was allegedly linked to nuclear missiles going off-line. In 2011,
George Knapp reported that "the UFO crowd" hoped that Barack Obama would be "the disclosure president" but got "on to something else" after Obama – responding to a 2011
We the People petition – affirmed there was nothing to disclose. Even after Obama's statement, some in the disclosure movement, such as advocate
Stephen Bassett, continued to assert he would be "the disclosure president". In 2013, Bassett organized a publicity event called the Citizen Hearing on Disclosure in which purported UFO witnesses provided testimony to six former members of the United States Congress with
Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick presiding over the meeting. Each of the six former members of Congress was paid $20,000, plus expenses, to attend. During the hearing,
Paul Hellyer alleged that two space aliens were coaching U.S. government officials about clean energy and that this was being suppressed by the petroleum industry. According to the
New York Daily News, the event was attended by about 100 members of the public, including
Louis Farrakhan,
Hollow Earth advocates, and people dressed in space alien costumes. Members of the public could also stream the event online for four dollars.--> In 2015, Clinton aide John Podesta posted a statement saying "my biggest failure of 2014: Once again not securing the #disclosure of the UFO files", adding the hashtag "#thetruthisstilloutthere". The following year when Podesta's emails were published by Wikileaks, the contents were noted for their discussion of UFOs. Podesta's UFO comments were a factor in leading some in the disclosure movement to believe that Hillary Clinton would spearhead disclosure. In October 2017, the company
To The Stars Inc. was founded by
Tom DeLonge (guitarist of
Blink-182), parapsychologist
Harold E. Puthoff, and author Jim Semivan. Personnel included disclosure advocates Christopher Mellon and Luis Elizondo. In December of that year, the company provided the first of what became known as the "Pentagon UFO videos" to the press.
Since 2017 Enthusiasm for disclosure accelerated on December 16, 2017 when the
New York Times published a story with the sensational headline "Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious U.F.O. Program" that reported on the
Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program and popularized speculations that the government might soon reveal "what it knows about UFOs". The same
Times story included the first of a series of
videos of UFOs filmed by US Navy pilots and claimed by advocates to depict vehicles representing "extraordinary technology". The videos further spurred interest in claims of secret government UFO files and extraterrestrial encounters. Disclosure advocates Harry Reid, Luis Elizondo, and Tom DeLonge expressed their hope that the release of the videos was only the beginning of further revelations to come. In 2019, Navy fighter pilot Ryan Graves founded the group
Americans for Safe Aerospace to "advocate for more disclosure by the military and other government agencies". In 2025, the
Wall Street Journal revealed that hundreds of Air Force personnel had been told, falsely, that there was "a secret program to harvest alien technology". The piece described it as "a long-running practice" that was "like a fraternity hazing ritual that spun wildly out of control." The report also explained that a classified electromagnetic pulse test had been responsible for UFO reports and missiles going offline in 1967, explaining
Robert Salas's account. US Congress subcommittees have held hearings advocating for government transparency since 2022, led by "a small group of policymakers who have been steadily prioritizing whistleblower hearings, public engagement sessions and other legislative efforts to promote more accountability and disclosure" regarding UFOs. In September 2025, a hearing hosted by Representative
Anna Paulina Luna included statements by former Air Force and Navy personnel Jeffrey Nuccetelli, Dyland Borland, and Alexandro Wiggins, as well as
George Knapp, described as "a prominent figure in the UFO disclosure community and frequent guest on the alien and paranormal-focused overnight radio show Coast to Coast AM". ==Adherents==