New Jersey lawmakers wanted drones and still want them.
Rep. Chris Smith may get an answer as he calls on the Department of Defense to shoot down one of the nearly 1,000 drones seen over the Garden State since Nov. 19. .
“Why can't we get at least one drone in the bag and get to the bottom of the case?” Smith asked at a press conference Saturday in Seaside Heights. “Why can't we even track suspicious drones back to their source? Do we have so little control over our airspace?”
Smith agrees with President-elect Donald Trump, who has already said he wants one drone removed.
Drone sightings have worried residents of New Jersey and New York for weeks. Federal authorities still can't say who they are or where they're coming from, but recent speculation suggests people on the ground may be misidentifying them as helicopters or small planes.
“What about you, Chief?” [Alejandro] Mr. Mayorkas, who for years infamously said our southern border was secure and closed, when he never was, now asks, “Did we not see anything out of the ordinary?” and insults our intelligence. “Is this normal?” Smith scoffed.
Smith accused federal authorities of dismissing the sighting as not a threat to civilians.
“How can you infer or assure the thousands of Americans who have seen drones that there is no threat?” Smith asked.
In addition to civilians, ships carrying police and coast guard members also reported seeing swarms of drones coming from the Atlantic Ocean.
“The elusive maneuvering of these drones signals the increasing sophistication of large-scale military forces, and is being used by violent authoritarian states such as Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea to test our defense capabilities. , or worse, whether these drones were deployed,” Smith said.
The Pentagon denies deploying drones.
“I wrote a letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin asking the Pentagon to authorize the use of force to suppress one or more of these unmanned threats to solve the drone mystery. ” announced Mr. Smith.
“Given how drone warfare has fundamentally changed warfare in Ukraine, Russia, the Middle East and elsewhere, now is not the time to trivialize or ignore the threat,” he added.
Smith said he is also starting to draft legislation that would “take serious protection of people and infrastructure at risk and give state police the authority to shoot down dangerous drones if necessary.” .
