Republican Lawmaker Seemingly Mistakes ‘Star Wars’ Prop for Recovered Drone

A Republican state senator posted an image of a prop spaceship from the Star Wars film franchise, seeming to suggest that it was an actual recovered drone.

Both intrigue and concern have flared in the past week over a high number of reports of mysterious drones flying over America’s Eastern Seaboard. The National Security Council said Tuesday that the drones are not a threat—that they are being legally flown by businesses, hobbyists, and law enforcement.

Doug Mastriano, a representative in Pennsylvania’s Senate, made an X post on Monday night, before an official explanation for the drones came down, in which he criticized the government’s response to the situation.

“It is inconceivable that the federal government has no answers nor has taken any action to get to the bottom of the unidentified drones,” he wrote. “The fecklessness of this administration was on display last year when a Chinese surveillance balloon was allowed to fly over the entire continental United States before being shot down. Such should be viewed as a threat to our nation and citizens and action is long overdue.”

His post included an image that showed a strange-looking aircraft fastened to the bed of an 18-wheel trailer. A caption on the photo read, “Breaking News: Crashed drone in Orange Beach retrieved from water, and taken to undisclosed location for further investigation.”

The object in the photo, however, wasn’t a drone at all—sharp-eyed commenters quickly realized it was actually one of the Star Wars universe’s iconic “TIE fighters,” fictional spaceships used by the Empire in its battle against the Rebel Alliance.

Commenters under the post wasted no time in mocking Mastriano for the apparent mix-up.

“That is not the drone you are looking for!” wrote user @ArtemisBSG, referencing a famous quote from Star Wars: A New Hope.

User @seanhalfcourt expressed their shock more bluntly, writing: “I’m sorry, you’re an elected state senator????”

Even though the original post seemed to include no indication that the image was a joke, Mastriano on Tuesday posted a brief statement claiming that he knew it was fake.

“I posted a statement about the drones and used an obvious Star Wars prop as a meme,” the 60-year-old wrote. “The Philadelphia Inquirer just called asking if I knew it was a prop. Hilarious. Modern day ‘journalism.’”

Mastriano, a far-right Donald Trump backer, was the Republican nominee for Pennsylvania governor in 2022, losing in a landslide to Josh Shapiro.

He vocally denied the 2020 presidential election results and also holds ties to QAnon conspiracy theorists, Politico reported.