This is a big week for anyone interested in the UFO mystery. The CBS News program 60 Minutes will air its first-ever report about UFOs Sunday night.
Those who favor the disclosure of government files related to UFOs have a model to follow, including testimony from experts.
In 2013, the world got a glimpse of what such hearings could accomplish. The Citizen Hearing on UFO Disclosure was presented in Washington, D.C. over a period of days.
A few dozen UFO investigators, witnesses, and scientists testified before a panel of former members of Congress and told the story of how UFO secrecy evolved and why it must end.
“Because UFOs are a definite matter of national security, those national security decision makers have made certain that the subject remains out of sight as much as possible.” This was the message historian Richard Dolan presented to the panel. Dolan has written several books about excessive government secrecy, in particular the secrecy surrounding classified files and programs dealing with UFOs.
Dolan and others think the subject deserves full disclosure, including formal Congressional hearings.
Actor and Filmmaker Reuben Langdon was the principal figure who made it happen.
“It’s the ABCs of Ufology,” Langdon said while speaking with Mystery Wire. “If you really are new to the subject, and you want to get into it, I know it’s still a lot to digest. 32 plus hours of testimony. But it is riveting when … you know, I’ve seen it a million times. So I still get sucked in. I’m sitting there editing, and then I stop editing. And I’ve just hit the play button. And I get sucked into the testimony.”
Langdon and others were trying to make a film around the hearing, but through some unfortunate financing that included silver bullion, the project was never completed.
The testimony and questioning are a video encyclopedia of the modern UFO era through 2013. And now, it’s available for free online. Reuben is publishing the video in several parts on the Citizen Hearing on UFO Disclosure YouTube channel.
Interview between George Knapp and Reuben Langdon transcript:
George Knapp
Reuben Langdon, great to talk to you I see your face Finally, after all the time we’ve communicated. Thanks for doing this.Reuben Langdon
Thanks, George, thanks for having me on.George Knapp
What is the correct title to sort of describe your role in the citizen hearing producer, dishwasher?Reuben Langdon
I would say producer and fire putter-outer. A lot of fires to put on on that one.George Knapp
I want to get into the story of how you got involved in this. But first, I want to jump right into the heart of the matter. And then we’ll backtrack a little bit. You know, Congress held two hearings in the UFOs, back in the 1960s, one in 66, one in 68. And neither of those dug too deeply into the weeds didn’t really allow the witnesses to go where they wanted to go. Do you think that the citizen hearing that you produced could serve as a model for what a genuine congressional hearing in the future could be?Reuben Langdon
And that was actually the goal was to sort of show the world that that’s that’s exactly what what could happen is if Congress took this topic, the UFO subject seriously, then perhaps it could go something like that. We did, through all the fires being put out and everything. And by the end of the week, it did sort of run itself pretty smoothly. And now we have this awesome archive for the world to experience and see.George Knapp
And what is your personal opinion on the likelihood of a Congressional hearing into this? In this context is we know from the last night the media wave is still building 60 Minutes is diving into the UFO world this weekend, going to do its first ever piece, The New York Times has a column today in its continuing coverage. We know that there have been a closed door Congressional briefings for senior staffers and elected members. And they were convinced enough by the evidence that they saw, we don’t know what that is exactly, that there should be a further inquiry. UAP Task Force gets created. How likely is it, do you think, given all that’s been happening, that you’ve been watching that there could be congressional hearings?Reuben Langdon
I think we’re heading in that direction. I think, you know, at the time, when we did the hearings, the citizen hearing, the Congress members, and especially Senator Gravelle, he was adamant that Congress was a lost cause, that we shouldn’t even be wasting our time there. And he was talking about going directly to the UN. Now after different things have unfolded through the UN and these sorts of things, I would say, that’s probably not a good route either. But we’re in a different time now. We’re in all of these disclosures have been happening, the, as you said, 60 Minutes, the media is actually now sort of warming up to this idea and concept so we could see something I think in the very near future. You know, Marco Rubio is doing his good deeds, and we’ll see if he can stir things up and get enough interest. I wouldn’t be, I wouldn’t be surprised if that was probably the next card that falls.George Knapp
Can you describe sort of the evolution of the citizen hearing how you became involved first.Reuben Langdon
Yeah, actually, through our mutual friend, Jeremy Korbel, he introduced us to some other friends in the UFO community. And then it, sort of the idea sparked, and at the time, I was running a production company, a visual effects company motion capture, I did a lot of that work on Avatar and in the video game world. So I had the facility in the team to put together not just the hearings, but a video production around it. And, and worked on a film around it. So that’s, I guess, having the company having that clout. When Thomas Clearwater came in with the investment, he saw that we were doing other things, and I guess he believed in us, trusted us. And said here you go and had a pretty sizable budget. And it was amazing that one guy was able to come up with that.George Knapp
I mean, I don’t know what the total cost was. But this was expensive. So many moving pieces and parts. So all these witnesses over several days, and then the members of Congress, you had to get them there. Can you describe what was Thomas’s reason for doing this and how much did he end up spending? Or can you say?Reuben Langdon
Well, initially it was a million dollar investment. You know, we had sort of packaged it as a return on investment would be made. That was the idea that concept was that this was going to be enough media was going to come on to this, that there would be, you know, we were hoping to build this momentum. That’s actually happening now, we were hoping to do that, you know, in 2013. But that was the initial investment, the initial cost that we had been budgeted everything out. We had also budgeted out enough money to do a film, which Jeremy was to direct called The Truth Embargo. And I guess I can talk about this now, it’s been so long. The only catch was, Thomas gave us the money not in cash, but in silver bullion. So we kind of did the numbers and did the math. And he’s like, well here, I can give you guys the money for this project. But in silver. And the catch is it has to be minted in order for you to sell it because it was like a big chunk of silver. And I guess, his reasoning behind it at the time, I think he was just getting turned on, so to say with this, the information may be having his own experiences. He never went to too much detail. But I think his family came from some oil money or something. So he had some money sitting in the bank or in the silver bullion bank. And he wanted to do what he could to contribute. And so he said, hey guys, here’s the catch. Are you guys willing to do this, so what we had to do was have a third party, actually, as they would mint the silver, then we would sell it. And then that was our production money for the project. Until, literally, like two days before the hearing. Silver took the largest dip, I think still today in history. Which made a good 15% almost 20% of our actual budget got wiped out overnight. And that essentially was the production film budget that we had allocated, the money that we had allocated for the film was now gone overnight.George Knapp
Well it would be nice to have that big pile of silver right now. given what’s happened to the prices.Reuben Langdon
Yeah, we’re seeing that we’re seeing the raises getting back. It’s almost back to where it was at that time. I think it was like close to $30 an ounce around that time.George Knapp
Can you give us a lineup of who the cast of characters is how many witnesses, how many members of Congress, how tough it was to get those former members of Congress involved in this.Reuben Langdon
Let’s see, there’s over 40 witnesses and, you know, spread across the world. There was many coming from South America. And I wasn’t so much in charge of handling that aspect. I was more in charge of the National Press Club, budgets. So with the witnesses part, I didn’t really handle that. The members of Congress actually were gathered together in a very short time, thanks to I’m trying to turn that sound off. I apologize. But the Congress members were pretty much found and gathered by a gentleman named Joe Buckman, who has been pretty active in the UFO community. And thanks to him, we got the members sort of at the last minute he had some ties to some of the political parties. I think he had run for Congress in the Libertarian party at some point, so he had some connections and things. And he was pretty much the sole person responsible for getting all the Congress members. And yeah, it just sort of came together at that time. We sort of had set the date, it was a little ambitious, considering we were dealing with silver bullion and my production company which had some liquidity with funding and stuff, but that really got out of hand really fast when silver took a dump. So we had, sort of scrambling to try to make the thing make the show go. And then we were like, well, we’ll figure it out later. Unfortunately, silver never came back. And the film never was able to come to fruition.George Knapp
But you’re sharing it now. We’ll get into that in a moment. Looking back now you’ve been editing the testimony for the new project that you’ve put online. When you look at, look back at what you’ve already edited, what’s the most impressive testimony to you? What things stand out for you?Reuben Langdon
Wow. Considering the time we’re in, you know, there’s a lot of talk about media suppression. And, and why isn’t the media covering this? And I remember during the hearings, you know, you’re probably the only guy out there really that’s done any real reporting on this? Well, I should say up in the past, you know, 10 years or so 20 years. That’s done any real reporting on the subject. In my mind, I thought this was going to be a game changer. We’re doing at the National Press Club. We have this cloud of former Congress members, one senator, all of these former military and government people, I thought there’s no way the media is going to be able to ignore this. And day one, we got ridiculed, there were a lot of small little blurbs and news snippets of you know, making fun of the project. Later in the testimony, this comes out, some of the Congress members addressed it. And, then by the end of it, I remember, we were so excited, because it was pretty devastating. When you’re in the middle of it, you’re putting everything on the line, my company, my livelihood, everything on the line to put this on. And to get this snickering and laughing and nobody taking the issue seriously, which we thought this was the ultimate, if you’re going to take if anything is going to make anybody take this subject seriously, this is the format, this is the way to do it. And it was not working. So there it was, it was pretty frustrating at the time to say the least. So as we’re going through the hearings, by Friday, we had a friend who had a friend at the New York Times and invited him down. And I think it was like on the last two days, maybe, finally, came down and finally sat in a few of the hearings, a few of the sessions. And then finally, that Saturday morning, sort of on the back page of the Saturday morning paper. We had a little blurb, a little write up in the New York Times, which was the first time the New York Times had ever said anything semi positive about the, without completely snickering it. They didn’t snicker, they sort of said, something’s going on here. Maybe we should pay attention. Nothing like the 2017 article. That was really the big door opener, as you know.George Knapp
One of the witnesses that jumped out of me, of course, is John Callahan, the former FAA guy who was there for a really remarkable case, the Japan Airlines case. Where the pilots encounter this gigantic acorn shaped object that the skeptics tried to describe as well, they mistook Jupiter or something like that. The FAA had evidence, they had hard evidence and John Callahan testifies about somebody from the CIA coming to get it, right?Reuben Langdon
Callahan’s testimony was super powerful, just because he’s a no frills guy. He just tells it as it is. And I think he’s told the story quite a few times. And he just was like, alright, I’m gonna just get it out there. And again, this was his testimony came in day five, the last day of the hearing, so that the Congress members were already pretty much on board with what was going on. It’s great to see their transformation. So I recommend everybody to watch from day one all the way through because you can really see how the Congress members, the questioning, the transformation that goes on through their way of thinking. And you can tell by their questions, by their reactions of this realization that there is something going on. Governments, our government especially, have been hiding it for so long and it’s real. It’s fascinating to watch them because I know my own transformation over the years, you know, from 2007, to now. But especially in those early years, when you come to that realization that there’s something going on here. And we’re not alone. That is, you usually don’t see it in yourself, and to see that moment in other people is quite something. And you can see that in the hearings, you can see that through this five day testimony. So getting back to some of the other powerful testimonies, I think what I was saying was that this media embargo, this media projection of what this subject matter is, which is transforming now tremendously at a very rapid rate. At that time, I did not think it was going to be so difficult. I guess I was naive. I didn’t know that, there was just a non interest or all the laughing and ridicule that was going on, I knew about it a little bit. But I guess I hadn’t been in the field long enough to really experience that. So I felt that then, and I was like, man, I poured my heart and soul into this. And there’s really something going on here. As far as just the complete lack of coverage. You know, we had Lee Spiegel, they’re not there. But he was watching the live stream. And he was doing some good reporting with the opinion that having a post, right, that was probably the only legitimate reporting that we had on the whole event, are you of course, we’ve covered it, as well, on the AI team and their AlJazeera did a little, little piece, but most of the mainstream media, if they did cover it, it was more making fun of it, marking it not not even coming close to to the seriousness of what we were trying to do, however, now a different era.George Knapp
So maybe we can do it all over again, then.Reuben Langdon
I think we should.George Knapp
Let me ask you this, can you describe sort of the plans for what you’re what you’re doing with it? What you will do with it, you’ve boiled it down, edited, put it in bite sized chunks that are consumable. And in essence, it’s like an encyclopedia of the UFO mystery and secrecy surrounding it. And I think that by the end of it, if people watch all of it, they’d be up to speed.Reuben Langdon
I think so. I always say it’s the ABCs of Ufology. If you really are new to the subject, and you want to get into it, I know it’s still a lot to digest, 32 plus hours of testimony. But it is riveting when you’re, you know, I’ve seen it a million times. So I still get sucked in. I’m sitting there editing, and then I stopped editing. And I just hit the play button. And I’m just I get sucked into the testimony. And again, I guess what I’m trying to say earlier, now more than ever, we can really understand not just the subject itself, but this truth embargo, this media hesitancy to cover the subject matter. Back then, it was not taken seriously. But now we’re seeing with the censorship that’s going to cross all of our social media platforms and everything else, There’s more correlation to, to what’s going on now than than before. And I think people can see it now clearer than before. So it was a big question at the time was, well, why would the media if this was real, why would the media, it was hard for us to believe that our media would deceive us. And now we’re at a point in time where enough silliness has gone on so I think people can actually see, oh okay, I see now why something a secret as the UFO subject matter would not be covered in the media in the way it should have been.George Knapp
So originally, the plan was to produce a film that would then be distributed to the world. Now, you are putting it on YouTube for free, episode by episode, right?Reuben Langdon
That’s it. Yep. I had worked rigorously over the summer to sort of re edit and up-rez a lot of the footage to just clean it up, really for a new release. Not really knowing exactly what was gonna happen or when in all of these disclosures that we’re experiencing now. So it kind of became the perfect storm for this release in the, with all the disclosures. And yeah, to put it out there to create this library. So people have a reference point, if they’re curious. And after seeing these disclosures that the great reporting you and Jeremy are doing, there’s now this awesome library that can just go back and it’s available to everybody on YouTube, nobody has to, you know, go and sign up and pay through the pay portal and all that. It was really, thanks to Tom Clearwater in his generous shift, he basically said, yeah, guys, go ahead. And now’s the time, let’s do this.George Knapp
So you’re putting out what an hour piece each week?Reuben Langdon
They average from an hour to some of them go a little over to about an hour and a half. I think one or two goes for almost like closer to two hours, but the general sessions that we had during the day, so each day consisted of two morning sessions and two afternoon sessions. And they were about, like I said, about little over an hour, to two hours and little breaks in between. And then we would break after the morning sessions would break for lunch and then we’d come back and do the whole thing again, and each one has sort of its own focus on, each session has its own focus on different, either a different event like with Callahan, that particular panel was more focused on pilots and what pilots see. We had some military pilots, but we also had just regular commercial pilots. And that’s where John was able to tell his testimony. So yeah, each one sort of has its own subject, its own focus point with the various witnesses. And those were some grueling days as far as just, they were fascinating. But I actually didn’t get to sit in the hearings that much. I was busy running around, putting out fires. But it’s a powerful, it was a powerful week. We had some interesting people show up. I think in session one, a lot of people have already commented, Minister Farrakhan was in our audience. And we had some comedians, we had all kinds of interesting people, I guess, who were local to DC there. We had opened it to the public, so they would show up and it was fun to talk to them behind the scenes.George Knapp
So the first three episodes are already posted, Citizen Hearing on UFO Disclosure, they’re up?Reuben Langdon
Yep. And they’re up.George Knapp
What day of the week do you post the next one?Reuben Langdon
Every Friday at 12 noon, we sort of set it to auto release. And like last Friday, I was able to get on the chats. Jeremy got on the week before, we’re going to try to continue this. So that either a tag team where we either both get on the chat when it’s released. And take people’s questions and comments. And it’s sort of a fun Friday afternoon. thing to view if you have time.George Knapp
What’s coming Friday?Reuben Langdon
I think it’s going more into Truth, Lies and Cover Up Part Two. So kind of, day one really sets the stage. It’s about the history, about the cover up, again, going into the media cover up and why the media is doing what they’re doing and or had done what they did. And that sort of sets it all up. For the last session of the day. And then we start the following week we get into Rendlesham Forest and some of the more specific events.George Knapp
Reuben Langdon, thanks for sticking with this and all the hours and hours and days and months and years of work. Can’t wait to see the next episode. And there’s an interactive quality as you said, people can chat back and forth and it’s a great time to release this because a lot of people are just now getting focused on the UFO topic. And this is a great way for them to catch up on the history of the subject and the secrecy surrounding it, the media disinterest for so long and thanks to you and to Thomas and Jeremy for putting all this stuff together.Reuben Langdon
Well, thanks to you for getting the word out and for doing all the awesome reporting you’ve done over the years, back in 2013, as well as all the disclosures, you continue to uncover and report on.George Knapp
Thanks Reuben.
UFOs : Truth, Lies & The Coverup / Part 2 with Grant Cameron, Linda Moulton Howe, Dr. Steven M. Greer, Held at the National Press Club, Washington D.C. April 29th – May 3rd, 2013 The Citizen Hearing on UFO Disclosure set out to accomplish what the U.S. Congress had failed to do for forty-five years – seek out the facts surrounding the most important issue of this or any other time – evidence pointing toward an extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race. Forty researchers along with military/agency/political persons of high rank and station came to the National Press Club in Washington, DC to testify to six former members of the United States Congress. The main ballroom of the National Press Club was configured to resemble a Senate hearing room. There were press areas, an audience area, witness tables and committee tables. Protocols for congressional hearings were followed as closely as possible during the testimony. Committee members received written statements from witnesses, heard oral statements and asked whatever questions they wished about the subject matter at hand. Hearing witnesses testified for thirty hours over five days in five morning and five afternoon sessions, each composed of two panels of witnesses, each panel lasting approximately ninety minutes. In the evenings, additional lectures were given by a number of top researchers in the field up Ufology. The Citizen Hearing on UFO Disclosure was a historic event. We are excited to be able to make the footage available, and allow these brave testimonies to become part of the public record on the topic of UFOs.
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