Immaculate Constellation: the Pentagon UAP archive in the Congressional Record

The November 13, 2024 joint hearing of the House Oversight Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation and the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs was titled "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth." The official congressional document index for the hearing, published on congress.gov, lists the following submitted materials: a letter from Christopher Mellon, submitted by Rep. Mace; documents related to UAPs, submitted by Rep. Burchett; and the item that had not previously appeared in any congressional record: "Report, Pentagon, 'Immaculate Constellation'; submitted by Rep. Mace."

A report submitted by a member of Congress to a committee hearing becomes part of the official congressional record. It does not constitute government confirmation that the program named in the report exists. It does constitute a formal congressional record of a specific allegation about a specific named program, submitted through the official mechanism of a congressional hearing, that is now publicly indexed at congress.gov. The document itself, the 12-page whistleblower brief, is available through docs.house.gov.

The distinction matters for TCR's primary source standard: the Immaculate Constellation report is not a government disclosure that the program exists. It is a government document , a congressional record , that formally records the allegation that it exists, the name under which it allegedly operates, and the specific capabilities it is alleged to possess. What makes it TCR material is that distinction: not speculation about a secret program, but a primary source document formally describing one, in the Congressional Record, alongside a formal Pentagon denial, at the same time sworn testimony about UAP programs was being given under oath by former senior officials.

The Immaculate Constellation report was written by Matthew Brown, a named whistleblower. Journalist Michael Shellenberger first published details of the report on October 8, 2024, in his newsletter Public. Filmmaker Jeremy Corbell subsequently facilitated the introduction of Brown to members of the House Oversight Committee and submitted the 12-page document for committee review in September 2024. The report, with Corbell's cover page, was formally submitted to the committee by Rep. Mace on November 13, 2024.

According to the report and subsequent accounts from Shellenberger, Brown discovered the program accidentally while accessing a database containing highly classified information. He did not seek it out. He encountered it, documented what it contained, and submitted a formal report to Congress.

The report's core allegations: Immaculate Constellation is an Unacknowledged Special Access Program that has operated since approximately 2017. It functions as a parent program overseeing multiple subordinate SAPs related to non-human intelligence. It uses artificial intelligence to scan classified military and intelligence server systems, identify UAP-related imagery, video, radar returns, and signals intelligence, and automatically extract and quarantine that material before it can spread to unauthorized recipients. It maintains a consolidated archive of this material. The program is managed by the Department of Defense but held at the White House. Congressional oversight mechanisms do not apply to it in the standard way because of its unacknowledged status.

On November 12, 2024, the day before the hearing, Pentagon spokesperson Sue Gough issued a statement to NewsNation: "The Department of Defense has no record, present or historical, of any type of SAP called 'IMMACULATE CONSTELLATION.'"

The denial is on record. So is the congressional submission of the report naming the program. Both occurred within 24 hours of each other. The Pentagon's statement addresses whether a SAP by that exact name exists in its records. It does not address whether a program with the alleged capabilities exists under a different name or within a structure that would not appear in the records the spokesperson searched. Unacknowledged Special Access Programs are, by design, not acknowledged. Whether the denial addresses the right question is itself a question the public record does not answer.

Four witnesses testified under oath at the November 13 hearing: former Department of Defense official and AATIP director Luis Elizondo; retired Navy Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet; former NASA associate administrator Michael Gold; and journalist Michael Shellenberger.

Elizondo's central statements: "Advanced technologies not made by our government or any other government are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe." And: "Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries." He described a "multidecade secretive arms race" around UAP technologies. When asked directly by Rep. Nancy Mace whether secret programs exist to identify and reverse-engineer alien craft, Elizondo answered yes.

Gallaudet's central testimony: he stated that "The continued overclassification surrounding UAPs has not only hindered our ability to effectively address these phenomena but has also eroded trust in our institutions." In his written testimony submitted before the hearing, Gallaudet stated that "elements of the government are engaging in a disinformation campaign, including personal attacks designed to discredit UAP whistleblowers." During the hearing he described a specific incident: he and all commanders of Fleet Forces received an email regarding a Special Access Program related to UAPs. The director of Fleet Forces subsequently realized the information should not have been shared. The day after the email was sent, it was wiped from every recipient's account. Gallaudet testified that no one spoke about it afterward.

Shellenberger testified that the Immaculate Constellation program, per the whistleblower report, was managed by the Department of Defense but held at the White House. He confirmed the existence of a large database addressing human physiological and psychological responses to UAP encounters.

If the Immaculate Constellation report is accurate, the significance of the program's design is the automated AI extraction function. Military and intelligence personnel who observe UAPs and capture imagery on tasked or untasked sensors would not necessarily know their data was being swept. The system would automatically identify and remove UAP-related material from accessible server environments before it could be reviewed through normal channels, reviewed by oversight mechanisms, or disclosed through FOIA. The program would function not merely as a classification mechanism but as a real-time information control system operating at the point of capture.

The report also alleges the program distinguishes between two categories of phenomena: UAP of apparent non-human origin, and what it terms Reproduction Vehicles , craft believed to be of terrestrial manufacture but based on reverse-engineered non-human technology. The implication, if the report is accurate, is that the program's operators have developed sufficient understanding of the phenomena to categorize observations at the point of collection.

Whether these allegations are true is not established by the Congressional Record entry or by the hearing testimony. What is established is that a named whistleblower submitted a formal brief to Congress making these specific allegations, that a member of Congress submitted it to the official hearing record, and that former senior officials with relevant clearances testified under oath at the same hearing that UAP programs exist, that the U.S. possesses UAP technologies, and that information about those programs has been actively managed to prevent congressional oversight.

The 12-page Immaculate Constellation report itself is in the Congressional Record. The underlying classified material it describes , the database, the extracted imagery, the sensor data, the AI system , is not. No FOIA request has produced confirmation or denial of the program's existence beyond the Pentagon spokesperson's statement. Requests to the Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel for any records relating to the program have not produced a response that confirms or denies any specific details.

The post-hearing written questions submitted to each witness by Rep. Burlison are in the record. The witnesses' responses to those questions are in the record. The full classified briefings that Elizondo, Gallaudet, and others have reportedly given to members of Congress in classified settings are not public. The specific programs Elizondo described when asked in a classified setting are not public. What the wiped Fleet Forces email contained is not public.