CONGRESSIONAL UAP UPDATE:
UAP DISCLOSURE ACT AGAIN FALLS BY THE WAYSIDE
On Sept. 29, 2025, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS) said on the Senate floor that the Senate Democratic leadership had not yet responded to "a second managers' package" that all Republican senators had already approved for the Senate version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA, S. 2296). "Second managers' package" refers to a proposed list of amendments that, with agreement from both parties, would be added to the NDAA without separate floor votes.
I confirmed today that the Schumer-Rounds UAP Disclosure Act (UAPDA)(Senate Amendment 3111) did NOT make it into this proposed managers' amendment package. Thus, it appears that the UAPDA did not achieve consensus support or acquiescence on the Republican side. I do not know the details regarding the impediment(s).
Since the House of Representatives already passed its version of NDAA (H.R. 3838) on Sept. 10 with no UAP language, this means that the UAPDA will not be enacted as part of this year's final NDAA.
(S. 2296 contains a couple of other modest UAP-related provisions, and two others are found in the Senate Armed Services Committee report on the bill; I reported in detail on the bill language and report language on July 16 and July 19, respectively.)
In 2023 the UAPDA cleared the Senate as part of a consensus managers' package (with no separate vote), but it did not survive negotiations in conference committee with the House. In 2024 the UAPDA was not included in the package that Senate NDAA managers carried to negotiations with the House.
Douglas Dean Johnson
