John Greenewald: That's right everybody. As always, thank you
so much for tuning in. And taking this journey inside the
black vault with me. I'm your host, John Greenwald, Jr,
founder and creator of the black vault.com. And I am going to
break down a story that some of you may have heard in the
mainstream media about the announcement of UFO files within
the Obama Presidential Library. I found myself kind of in the
center of this story, I had posted it last week on social
media, Vice News was first to pick it up. And in essence, it
will break down the whole story. But in essence, it was the
discovery of literally 1000s of potentially related UFO files,
or files related to OS app or a tip to programs that we've
talked a lot about on this channel. Obviously all connected
to this, again, secret Pentagon UFO study story that is
circulated since 2017. Since the end of 2017. Well, since that
time, Vice News, since the time VICE News picked it up. All
sorts of media outlets now around the world are covering
this because this is kind of a, I would say.
Unexpected, but phenomenal discovery, pardon the pun. But
the reason I say that is because all SAP and a tip and UFO
related information when it comes to the era of a tip is
kind of hard to come by we know about OS app within the DIA. We
know that there are some files, we think within DOD but really
nothing has come out yet. When it comes to the actual program
files. Is this something that includes that are we really
going to dive into what the program was? Is this just
communication? I don't have the answer to that. But I'm here to
break down the story. Now, let me just dispel maybe any
expectations here right up front. I'm not here to show you
the files because they're not being released yet. I'll get
into the timetable in a few minutes. But that's not what
this video is. Rather, I want to break down for you guys the
process. What is the story that's being circulated by
mainstream media and additional new information that I haven't
talked about yet? I briefly spoke about it yesterday when I
did a panel discussion for the LA law library that was online.
Now I posted this out a few times. It was a 100% free panel.
And I was honored to take part. This was not a UFO organization.
Nor was it a quote unquote, UFO event, although UFOs were talked
about, in a panel about the Freedom of Information Act at
this law library in Los Angeles, I was on a panel with Michael
Morrissey, who is the founder of Muckrock. And Grace Chen, who is
part of Thomson Reuters and works within that news
organization. So I was honored to take part in that and appear
with them. Because they are two incredibly smart individuals.
And we got to break down in different ways the FOIA and then
ultimately how it has connected to the UFO topic, just to show
some of the documents that came out. I did see some familiar
names in the audience list. So thank you guys for registering.
But it was really nice to kind of break out of the UFO
community, so to speak, and talk to an environment like that.
This is Sunshine Week. So happy Sunshine Week to you all, if you
don't know what that is this week is a celebration of open
records laws and, and essentially celebrating our
rights as American citizens, but really citizens of the world
that can take part in the federal Freedom of Information
Act, our right to access information. So Sunshine Week
really reflects on our ability to do that. And although some
may think FOIA doesn't produce results, I'm here to tell you,
it absolutely does. I don't consider it a broken law, but
rather one that you know, needs some stitches and band aids here
in there. But this week is all about celebrating it. And so
that is what my appearance was for the LA Law Library. And
Monday, I got to talk to the University of Richmond and a
class there. And from what I understand that video actually
may be made public pretty soon but it was a lot of fun to speak
with, with those that were involved in the university
there. And that was a great time for me. So let's get into the
video itself. I just wanted to give a little bit of background
about this weekend. And what Sunshine Week is, but again,
this is this is the story that everybody kind of is hearing
about. And let me pull up the visual. So we're going to break
down the UFO files at the Obama Presidential Library story.
Again, not to repeat this, but vice was first to pick it up,
it's been covered by Newsweek, the independent build in
Germany, I've seen a couple other international news
organizations pick it up some obscure ones as well. But
regardless, it's really a story that has circulated a lot. It
even ended up on the top of the Drudge Report, whether or not
you like that site or not, it remains one of the most coveted
spots in news. So whenever one of these stories appears on
there, it's it's kind of a big injection of exposure for not
only this topic, but obviously the news story at hand. So let's
kind of start breaking it down a little bit about what that story
is. Now, a quick background to presidential files, and how they
work, it ties into the Presidential Records Act, the
White House as it sits, like right now,
the the excuse me, the Biden administration, I can't file a
FOIA to the White House. Those records, which are considered
presidential records are covered by the Presidential Records Act.
And what that means is, is that those are completely off limits
to FOIA until four years after the presidential administration
ends. So when Obama had left office, and President Trump took
over for years thereafter, Obama's records were open to the
general public. So that was in January, I was sadly suffering
from COVID at the time. So it took me a couple of days to get
the request in. But there were some people that that were
quoted as literally waiting up until midnight, for them to
submit the request because they wanted to be first in line. Of
course, in retrospect, I would have liked to have been first in
line based on what you're about to hear. But regardless, you
know, that's, that's That's how serious some people are. But
just kind of a background. That was when I was suffering from
COVID. So took me a couple of days after that, that initial
date, to file the Freedom of Information Act request. This is
what I requested. Let me see, it's not the whole request, but
I just wanted to kind of break down exactly what it was. I
respectfully request a copy of records, including foot videos
and photos, electronic or otherwise, of the following
unidentified flying objects, unidentified aerial phenomena or
phenomenon, respectively, they are also referred to as UFOs and
UAPs. I ask that you include all readily available records that
pertain to the topic because I believe during the Obama
administration, there was rumored to be UFO investigation
under the names advanced aerospace weapon systems
application program, or OS app, along with the program, advanced
aerospace threat Identification Program, or a tip, I ask that
you include all records pertaining to these two program
names and acronyms as well, that may reside in the Obama
Presidential Library Holdings. That's just for you, for your
people on how these things are structured. And I'm going to get
into what response that this yielded. Right now, this was the
not the first I'm not going to break down everything for you,
you get an interim response that kind of puts you in line. This
was the first response of substance. And you can see here,
my request was submitted January 23 2022. This came on March 10.
And I'm not going to read it verbatim. But you can see it's
just in response to my FOIA requests. They reference, you
know, the different public record laws for you. So on and
so forth. Paragraph two, however, let me pull up the pen
here. So I can point where I'm at. Right here. We've performed
a search of our collection for presidential records relating
related to your request and have identified approximately 3440
pages. And 26,271 electronic files of potentially responsive
records that must be processed in order to respond to your
request. Please keep in mind that these totals are an
estimate and that all material processed may not be applicable
to your specific topic. This is what's interesting about this
breakdown, It's oddly specific. And it is not an all
encompassing number, because we know that there's a lot more
than 3400 pages at the Obama Library. What I was waiting for
before I did this video was Where did how did what did they
do to get these numbers? And I don't have an answer to that
yet. And I'm not sure when that will come this could come an
hour after I posted this video a day or a decade, who knows. But
at least I have enough to kind of give you guys the story. So I
don't know how they got those numbers. But I can tell you from
experience when you have something oddly specific like
that, they did something to yield that number. Now the key
word here is is the potentially responsive so potentially is in
there. That means that that gives them a little bit of
wriggle room, that when I get my final response, it may be 1000
pages not 3400. And the reason for that is a quite a few
different things. But in my opinion, it's if they, you know,
come up with things like news articles and stuff like that. If
I omit them, then they won't include them. It's getting a
little technical when I start talking about that, but But in
essence, if a lot of people within the Obama administration,
were forwarding around news articles, no context, no
editorial, no comments or anything like that, but rather,
they see Obama being referenced. And they forward news articles,
that happens a lot. Well, those
are subject to FOIA. But it's not really interesting. So and
the reason is, it's just a newspaper article. So it doesn't
really matter, you know, if you if you file a FOIA request, and
they still have to review it. So a lot of times in a FOIA, you
can say I omit all publicly available information like
newspaper articles. So they use the word potentially simply
because they do answer these very much like a lawyer. But on
top of that, you're also not being locked in to to
guaranteeing me there's 3440 pages, because that opens it up
to a nightmare, where I get 1000 pages, and I go, Hey, wait a
minute, here's my appeal, you guys said this, so on and so
forth. So it's a little bit safety language as well. The
26,271 electronic files was was, to me more mind blowing than the
3400 pages, because I wasn't sure exactly what that
encompassed. I'll tell you what, that encompasses in a second.
That's the new information that I haven't talked about yet. I
had responded, I had posted out the on the 10th. The the
announcement from the Obama Library that that this was found
during my request, which I was floored, I use those words on
Twitter, I'll echo them here now. And I even said this in
Twitter, if true. I'm floored because I didn't expect that I
really didn't. That's a big chunk of data on a program that
has very little to its name, at least as I as I record this. I
know that some people may not like me for saying that. But
that's just the reality for you. It hasn't produced anything
because DIA is sorely behind. And the Pentagon is very much
pushing back on the fact that they really don't have anything,
emails of Luis Elizondo have been deleted. That's a big
story. So it's very hard to come by these records. So when the
Obama administration says we have literally 10s of 1000s of
pages in electronic files, you got my interest because UFO
related or not? It sounds like it might be about us apparatus,
or both. Now we're now we're talking now this will break down
what is really going on and on top of all else, why was the
White House involved in this conversation? So if this ends up
to be all newspaper articles, I'll be quite surprised, I
highly doubt that it is the last response. And here's the new
stuff. So I'll spend a little bit more time on this. This is
the breakdown of the of the material itself. And I want to
go back aside because I was jumping ahead too quickly. When
I had received the breakdown, I wrote them back after I posted
all that material and said, essentially, how long is this
going to take? Is there any eta what can I you know, what can I
expect from this. And you can see here in this paragraph, as
stated on our latest letter dated February 18, part of and
then the case number, it's been piggybacked on onto a FOIA
request previously submitted for similar records. The request
that yours is piggybacked on to is in the complex, unclassified
electronic queue, and there are 64 requests ahead of it in this
queue. Our best estimate at this time is that it may be completed
in approximately 12 years. This paragraph here as stated in our
letter, dated March 10 2022, part of requests 22 Dash 21122
Dash F. For those listening to the audio version, that's the
case number is in the complex, unclassified electronic queue,
and there are 87 requests ahead of yours in this queue. Our best
estimate at this time is that it may be completed in
approximately 16 years. If you have any questions regarding
your FOIA request, please contact our staff like Jaren
better believe I got questions. First and foremost, why 64
requests causes a 12 year backlog and why 87 requests in
what is kind of worded the same, the same queue complex
unclassified electronic cue complex, unclassified electronic
cue. The same exact cue is referenced in both paragraphs
with different numbers ahead of it. same case number, and the
ETA differs by four years. I don't have an answer to that
either. Trying to figure that out, I think it may have likely
been a typo. There may be two different queues here, but they
copy and paste it and didn't update what the actual queue is
named. That's a possibility also, regardless,
we're looking at well over a decade by their estimate, before
we see anything, no, I'm not accepting that I am working on
potentially getting some political involvements and
politicians that may be on my side, we'll see if that comes to
fruition. I've also got a couple other things, and I'm working
directly with the library. I don't have anything to report at
this point where the timeframe is shrinking, but I am working
one on one with them. I've had more correspondence with them
today, trying to break down essentially, how we can speed
this up and and make this a lot quicker than a decade. Okay, so
now because I was getting ahead of myself, this is the newest
response that I have that breaks down what those files are. I'm
going to break it down paragraph by paragraph, your request for
records pertaining to documents and communications about
unidentified flying objects and unidentified aerial phenomena
has been piggybacked onto a FOIA request previously submitted for
similar records as stated in our letter dated March 11. This
request is in the complex, unclassified electronic queue.
And there are 64 requests ahead of it in this queue, our best
estimate is 12 years. Looking at the case logs that were
published, I am likely piggybacked with Grant Cameron,
who who submitted a UFO UAP related request about three days
prior to mine, which I believe was the first day that you could
submit so he was right there waiting to do this, he filed
quite a few other requests. So go him because he was right
there in line ready to go. Your request for advanced aerospace
weapon system application program was also piggybacked,
but we were unable to locate any unclassified records related to
this topic. Classified records are at the National
declassification center, their search may result in potentially
classified records that are responsive to your request, I
will send notification once our initial search is completed.
What I'm not sure here is if they are aware that they are
classified or SAP related documents, or they're waiting
for the National declassification center, to give
them an answer, still waiting on that, but at least they are
again breaking down what they've told me previously. This is
where it gets a little bit more interesting. Your request for
records pertaining to documents, and communications of the
advanced aerospace threat Identification Program, and
photos and videos of unidentified flying objects,
unidentified aerial phenomena or phenomenon, advanced aerospace
weapon system application program and the advanced
aerospace threat Identification Program is the other portion of
the request. As stated in our letter, dated March 10 2022.
This request is in the complex, unclassified electronic queue.
And there are 87 requests ahead of yours in this queue. Our best
estimate at this time is that it may be completed in
approximately 16 years. So I'm guessing because this wasn't
piggybacked on anything. The way that I worded it really is
making them dig for these OSS app and or a tip related records
potentially containing videos and photos. And for whatever
reason, they believe that this particular part of the request
will be 16 years. Here's the great part. As stated in our
letter dated March 10 2022, we have identified approximately
3440 pages
and 26,271 electronic files, estimated to be equivalent to
131,355 pages of potentially responsive records that must be
processed in order to respond to your request. This is placed a
request in a complex queue. Yeah, no kidding, your request
will be processed in segments, because of the volume of
potentially responsive records, we will review 50,000 pages and
then this request will go to the end of the queue. This means it
will take longer for you to receive the records that you're
interested in. So remember those 16 years is likely not 16 years,
but a lot more according to them. I am again working with
the library to get them to reduce this and reduce the
scope. I'm already telling them to omit certain things. And at
this point, I may consider breaking this request into
numerous other requests to see what we can do. Regardless. Part
of that gets a little bit technical, but I'm letting you
know that even though it's so disheartening to hear 16 years
To wait, and then when you see this break down even longer.
Yeah, that's frustrating, but know that I'm just not laying
down and rolling over and taking the estimate, but rather working
very hard to reduce that, reduce the scope and see what we can
do. The congressman from Tennessee timber, Chet was
apparently very surprised by the story for those who don't follow
on social media. I was surprised myself, Congressman Burchette,
saw the story, saw my tweet about it, retweeted it, and said
great work. And I was quite impressed by that, because it's
not every day that a sitting congressman retweets a UFO
related story and complements the work behind it. So I had
tweeted to him a thank you that I you know, this is a
nonpartisan issue. So it doesn't matter what your thoughts are on
a sitting congressman or not or what their political
affiliations are or not or what Bill they supported in the past
or not. This is a nonpartisan issue and should remain so. And
so I had just tweeted him thank you said I was honored that he
saw the story and felt the need to share with his followers,
constituents and so on. And he retweeted that, and said that
this, this entire story is a cover up to essentially keep at
it. And for them for them meaning Congress to relay a UFO
related story is big enough for him to retweet my thanks for
doing that and saying keep at it, this is a cover up. That was
something even more extraordinary, you just don't
see that every day. So I was surprised at that and happy to
see it. And surprisingly, Congressman Burchette was not
even one of the congressmen and senators that I reached out to
for help. So the fact that he saw it somehow and felt the need
to go out of his way to do that. Very, very cool. But it shows
how the tides have turned a little bit when it comes to
Congress. And the conversation about UFOs. In closing, I want
to go back and punch the one point 131,355 pages of
potentially responsive records. That is a huge load of records.
The CIA only has about 3030 500. The NSA has, you know, 800 to
1000. The DIA, I think collectively has 1000 Very rough
estimates.
But you're talking about very small numbers on UFOs. For the
Obama administration to come back and say we have over 130
Potentially responses 130,000 Potentially responsive records,
that is a huge deal. Even 10% of that, if they consider it
relevant and for whatever reason that other 90% Wasn't, that's a
big deal. I will dispel the potential myth that is brewing
that this is a generic number that this is what's at the
library. And I will just say again, there's no way that that
they only have 131,000 pages of digital files to sift through to
see if any are related to a tip. Obviously, they will have into
the the millions of pages over a year administration. So so even
though that sounds like common sense, probably to most of you,
I have seen that argument that they just thought oh, well, you
know, this is what we have at the library. So this is this is
what we have to search through, they did something. And that's
what I'm figuring out on how they came up with those numbers.
And I will update you on social media. But also on top of that,
do a new video if it is extraordinary, and something I
should inform you on. So that's the story. That's the breakdown.
I know, sometimes this gets a little dry, don't get me wrong,
it gets a little repetitive because they use the same
language. So for me to tell you properly the story, you might
hear things a couple different times, simply because I hear
them a couple different times. But I do that too, to not only
keep you guys informed, but on top of that I know a lot of you
and even a bigger percentage this week with the exposure for
Sunshine Week, are looking into FOIA and how it can work for
them. And I like going through these because it shows you what
is normal, sometimes what is not normal, what's abnormal in these
types of requests, but also what you guys can expect if you
decide to dive into the FOIA. For the rest of you, if it just
goes on too long. I do apologize. But that is the
update. That's where we're at. And it's just onwards and
upwards. From here. We'll see what the Obama Library says. I
want to close with this even though again, it is frustrating
to get those estimates but encouraging at the amount of
information that's found. I have zero complaints at the
communication from the Obama Library. And that is something
that I very much appreciate as a researcher And somebody that
although is met with a extraordinarily long timeframe,
very much appreciate their willingness to work with me and
break down the information very quickly, because they have
responded to some of this very, very quickly when I have
questions. Hopefully it stays that way. But well, you know,
jury's still out on that. But at least at this point, I do want
to take the time, especially here on Sunshine Week, to
recognize an agency that is very communicative. And hopefully
those 16 and 12 year estimates are nothing of the sort because
that shouldn't happen with 60 or 80 cases at this point. So I'll
keep you updated. Thank you guys so much. I know I'm a broken
record on this part, please. If you're on YouTube, give that
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word. Thank you guys. This is John Greenewald, Jr signing off,
and we'll see you next time.