Obama says aliens are real. What more does he know?

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

Podmasters

News, Society & Culture, Politics, Government

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 25 February 2026

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Barack Obama set the internet alight when he declared on a podcast that aliens are “real”. However, the former US president later insisted that, while in office, he saw no evidence of this and that he was just answering a speed round question. Once the preserve of late-night radio and fringe forums, UFOs are now discussed in Congress, scrutinised by the Pentagon and casually referenced by presidential hopefuls. Alex von Tunzelmann separates fact from fantasy with Andy McGrillen, author of Atlas of Unidentified Flying Objects and host of That UFO Podcast to find out what’s the difference between serious scientific inquiry and full-blown conspiracy culture? • Buy Andy’s book Atlas of Unidentified Flying Objects and Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org’s fees help support independent bookshops too. www.patreon.com/bunkercast Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Robin Leeburn. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production. www.podmasters.co.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:39.8	Welcome to The Bunker News Without the Nonsense.
0:41.4	I'm Alex von Hanselman.
0:47.4	Now, you may have seen that Barack Obama caused an online frenzy last week after saying during a podcast appearance, we love those, that aliens are real.
0:52.7	He quickly clarified on Instagram that he meant there's a statistical
0:56.0	likelihood of life elsewhere in the universe, not that there have been visitors to Earth, as far as he
1:01.7	knows. The former president said he was simply trying, quote, to stick with the spirit of a lightning
1:07.8	question round, and that during his time in office, he saw no evidence
1:12.5	of alien contact. Even so, the episode shows how a subject once treated as a fringe
1:19.3	conspiracy hobby for some rather peculiar people can attract wider interest in mainstream
1:24.9	politics and public debate these days. In 2016, Hillary Clinton
1:29.1	said she would get to the bottom of UFO files. Donald Trump has mused about alien life on podcasts,
1:36.2	and unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAPs, are now discussed annually in the US Congress. In 2022,
1:43.9	the Pentagon said it wanted to remove any
1:45.8	shame in reporting UAPs because they could represent national security threats.
1:51.1	Now, what often gets blurred together here are three quite different ideas, the scientific
1:56.0	question of whether life exists elsewhere in the universe, the practical problem of aerial
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