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Former U.S. President Barack Obama tried to rein in a viral wave of online talk about extraterrestrials by clarifying that he has seen no evidence of aliens contacting Earth, and that he was not suggesting such beings were held at the government’s Area 51 test site in Nevada.
Obama’s first remarks came during a lightning-round segment with podcast host Brian Tyler Cohen, when he was asked whether aliens are real. In that exchange, Obama answered, “They’re real,” but then added that he had not seen them and that they were “not being kept in Area 51.”
After the podcast comments spread widely, Obama released a statement on Instagram that he presented as a clarification of what he meant by his earlier answers. In the statement, Obama said he was trying to stick with the “spirit of the speed round,” but that once the comments had drawn attention, he wanted to explain his view more fully.
Obama’s Instagram post also said that, “Statistically, the universe is so vast that the odds are good there’s life out there.” He added that the “distances between solar systems are so great,” and that “the chances we’ve been visited by aliens is low,” before stating that he had “seen no evidence during my presidency that extraterrestrials have made contact with us.”
The renewed attention to Obama’s comments came alongside the long-running fascination with Area 51, a top-secret Cold War-era test site in the Nevada desert that has become a magnet for UFO conspiracy theories. Secrecy around the facility has persisted for decades, with some conspiracy claims alleging extraterrestrial encounters or coverups.
The CIA acknowledged the existence of the site in 2013, according to the reporting. The same reporting also said that the CIA’s acknowledgment did not extend to popular claims that aliens had crashed there or that extraterrestrials were being secretly kept.
Declassified documents, meanwhile, have referred to the installation by name after years of U.S. government officials refusing to acknowledge it. Those records have described Area 51 as a testing ground for advanced aircraft, including the U-2 in the 1950s and later the B-2 stealth bomber, adding to the contrast between documented military activity and the viral alien narrative Obama moved to correct.