Christopher Mellon

Christopher Mellon spent nearly 20 years in U.S. defense and intelligence roles before becoming one of the most prominent public voices calling for greater government transparency on UAP. He is best known for passing declassified Navy UAP videos to journalists in 2017, a move that helped spark a new wave of congressional and Pentagon attention to the topic.

What did Christopher Mellon do in government?

Mellon's government career ran from 1985 to 2017 and focused on defense and intelligence oversight. He served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. On Capitol Hill, he worked for many years on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, eventually becoming its Minority Staff Director. While in the Senate, he also conceived and drafted the legislation that established the U.S. Special Operations Command.

How did he get involved in UAP?

In 2017, Mellon joined To the Stars Academy of Arts and Sciences (TTSA) as a paid adviser with the title "National Security Affairs Advisor." That same year, he received a physical package of declassified Navy UAP videos from an unnamed Defense Department official in a Pentagon parking lot. He then delivered those videos to New York Times journalists Leslie Kean and Ralph Blumenthal. The Washington Post also identified him in 2017 as having worked with the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), the Pentagon's 2007-2012 UAP investigation program.

What happened after the videos were published?

The release of the Navy videos in December 2017 contributed to the creation of the Pentagon's UAP Task Force. Mellon publicly confirmed in the 2020 documentary *The Phenomenon* that he was the source who passed the footage, which included the FLIR/Nimitz "Tic Tac," GIMBAL, and GOFAST videos recorded by U.S. Navy pilots. Along with Luis Elizondo, he was credited for bringing the USS Nimitz and USS Theodore Roosevelt Navy UAP videos to TTSA.

What has he argued publicly since then?

In a March 2018 op-ed in the *Washington Post*, Mellon argued that the Pentagon was not adequately investigating UAP despite repeated military encounters. He has also written for The Debrief criticizing what he characterized as "the deafening silence by the United States Air Force on cooperating with the Pentagon and Congress in relation to UFOs/UAPs." He has publicly advocated for the UAP Disclosure Act and lobbied Congress to require standardized UAP reporting and regular briefings to elected officials.

What is he doing now?

In May 2025, Mellon participated in a Capitol Hill briefing titled "Understanding UAP: Science, National Security and Innovation," hosted by the UAP Disclosure Fund in collaboration with the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability. At that event, he stated that U.S. advanced sensor systems capture data on anomalous incursions that has historically not reached Congress, AARO (the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office), or the scientific community. He has also appeared on NewsNation's "Reality Check with Ross Coulthart" stating he believes the government should release more information about UAP encounters.