New Jersey officials criticize federal response to reported drone sightings: 'They're lying'

Federal authorities are facing mounting pressure to address a recent surge in reported drone sightings across the East Coast, as residents and local officials express growing concern.

Since mid-November, dozens of New Jersey residents have reported seeing drones flying over their neighborhoods. In Hunterdon County alone, for example, 49 separate sightings were reported, though it’s not clear whether it was the same drone being reported multiple times. Witnesses have said they can hear loud humming sounds and see the drone’s lights, especially as they seem to fly only in the evenings.

While the FBI has said it is investigating the New Jersey drone reports, many residents seem unsatisfied with how the situation is being handled. In an effort to quell concerns, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a joint statement issued on Dec. 12 that there was “no evidence at this time that the reported drone sightings” in New Jersey “pose a national security or public safety threat or have a foreign nexus.”

White House National Security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Monday that some of the reported drone sightings "include a combination of lawful commercial drones, hobbyist drones and law enforcement drones, as well as manned fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters and even stars that were mistakenly reported as drones."

“We have not identified anything anomalous or any national security or public safety risk over the civilian airspace in New Jersey or other states in the Northeast," Kirby added.

Some state officials, however, have suggested that there is more to the story. New Jersey Assemblyman Erik Peterson, a Republican who said he had been briefed by DHS about the drone situation, told CNN, “They’re lying to us.”

“First, they say you’re not seeing what you’re seeing,” Peterson said on CNN This Morning on Dec. 14. “There’s nothing here, nothing here to be seen. And then they tell us that they don’t know what it is. They don’t know what’s happening. It’s all a lie.”

Peterson said he personally has seen drones fly above his home “in a rural part of New Jersey,” where, he said, the lack of streetlights made it easy to spot the unmanned aircraft flying overhead.

At a news conference in Seaside Heights, N.J., over the weekend, Seaside Park. N.J., Mayor John Peterson Jr. told reporters, "These issues are very, very concerning, and the response from the federal government is very, very insulting."

Matthew Murello, the mayor of Washington Township, N.J., said he had also seen drones flying over his town and shared similar concerns about the federal authorities’ response so far to Good Morning America on Monday morning.

“Something’s going on,” Murello said. "Nobody knows what these things are doing. Best-case scenario, they're just getting video of us. Again, I don't know why out here. We're nothing but farm country. If you want videos of cows, I'll be happy to send you some."

Murello theorized that there are two potential reasons why the federal government seems to be downplaying the drone sightings.

"One is somebody knows something and they're just not willing to tell us," he said, referring to two specific New Jersey drone sightings near the Morristown Municipal Airport and President-elect Donald Trump’s Bedminster golf course.

Trump has also speculated about the situation on Truth Social, writing on Dec. 13, “Can this really be happening without our government’s knowledge. I don’t think so! Let the public know, and now. Otherwise, shoot them down!!!” It is illegal under federal law for anyone to shoot down a drone.

Murello’s second “scary” theory, based on the government’s public response so far, is that the U.S. “is the greatest nation in the world with the most technologically advanced military on the planet Earth, and we don't know what the hell these things are.”

Spokespeople for the FBI and DHS did not immediately respond to Yahoo News' requests for comment.

On ABC's This Week Sunday, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas offered an explanation for the recent increase in nighttime drone sightings.

“In September of 2023, the Federal Aviation Administration, the FAA, changed the rules so that drones could fly at night,” Mayorkas explained, suggesting “that may be one of the reasons why now people are seeing more drones than they did before, especially from dawn to dusk.”

Mayorkas also said that “there are thousands of drones flown every day in the United States, recreational drones, commercial drones.”

Kirby told reporters last Thursday that despite a federal investigation into the drone sightings in New Jersey, there “is no known malicious activity occurring.”

When asked if President Biden’s administration is considering prohibiting all drone use in U.S. airspace, Kirby replied, "I don't know that we're at a stage right now where we're considering that sort of a policy option.” Instead, Kirby said the White House was calling on Congress to pass legislation to expand the right for authorities to identify and counter drones that are considered threatening.

In addition to New Jersey’s drone reports, there have been multiple reported sightings in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Massachusetts and Ohio. Local officials from these states have expressed similar concern about how the federal government has been responding to the news.

“There is a lot of us who are pretty frustrated right now,” Democratic Connecticut Rep. Jim Himes, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee, told Fox News Sunday. “‘We don’t know’ is not a good-enough answer.”

In a Dec. 14 statement, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin wrote: "I remain deeply concerned that Virginia has consistently sought information from federal partners, and to date, the information shared with the Commonwealth has been insufficient.”

Outside of the six states with reported drone sightings, there have also been two recent arrests in connection with drone operations near restricted areas in California and Massachusetts.

Last week, the U.S. attorney's office for the Central District of California announced that 39-year-old Yinpiao Zhou, a Chinese citizen and legal permanent resident of the U.S., was arrested at San Francisco International Airport for allegedly taking unauthorized drone footage at the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California when SpaceX was launching “a National Reconnaissance Office payload.”

On Saturday, officers arrested two Massachusetts residents on Long Island after they allegedly flew a drone “dangerously close” to the Logan International Airport in Boston.