Leslie Kean

The investigative journalist and author who transformed the UFO phenomenon into a serious subject of discussion

Name	Leslie Kean
Age	Between 56 and 65
Born	In the 1960s
Famous for	Her articles that expose the U.S. government’s secret UAP investigations

Leslie Kean is a respected name in the UFO/UAP community. Her investigative journalism into the UFO phenomenon has enabled her to meet high-profile members of the government and military who have either had relevant encounters or firsthand information.

Since 2000, she has published articles related to UFOs, with two of these significantly contributing to the way the U.S. government shares UFO information (more on this later). She had also been a board member of UFODATA.

Her Entry to UFO/UAP Research

Leslie Kean had read and heard about UFOs over the years. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that she began showing interest in the subject.

It started with the UFO report her friend from France sent, which she found intriguing: the COMETA Report. It was an unofficial document submitted by generals, admirals, scientists, and engineers to then-French president Lionel Jospin. Here, they concluded after three years of study on UFO/UAP that the most rational explanation for these cases was the “extraterrestrial hypothesis,” that we were being visited by extraterrestrial vehicles.

Now, from a journalist’s perspective, that’s a big story. She then went on to cover this, which was published in the Boston Globe (more on this later). Her news story was well received, especially by the UFO/UAP community, who were happy to see a journalist like her taking this phenomenon seriously.

Since then, she has written articles on UFOs, with many of these being published in The Huffington Post, The New York Times, and The Debrief.

Her Beliefs About the UFO Phenomenon

Leslie Kean claims that the UFO phenomenon is undeniable, and so UFOs exist. It’s a fact, even though we can’t identify what they are exactly yet.

Why are they here? Where do they come from? What are their plans on Earth?—These are the questions we want to find the answers to. She said that we have to go step-by-step with this in order to obtain solid evidence to affirm the UFOs’ existence. Once, The Clinic correspondent Daniel Belmar asked her, “If one day the race that controls the UFOs invades us, would it be something like the War of the Worlds or more like Marvel’s The Avengers?”

Here’s her reply:

[Laughs] I have no answer for that. But if you want to play that game, I could tell you that the UFOs that are documented are very different from the ones seen in War of the Worlds.

Her Works and Contributions

Leslie Kean reported many UFO news stories and, at times, exposés in her lifetime. Let’s look at some of the works she did that put her at the forefront of Ufology.

Books

UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record

You can rule out 95% of UFOs. It’s the 5% you can’t rule out that you have to deal with.—Kean agreed with this statement in an interview with Dylan Ratigan on his MSNBC show. And the cases she presented in this book, UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record, are among that 5%.

This book is the culmination of her more than 10 years of studying the UFO phenomenon. Here, she presents solid evidence that UFOs exist based on gathered data, including government documents, aviation reports, radar data, and case studies.

She also talked with high-profile officials and witnesses around the world, several of whom were contributors to this book:

• Ray Bowyer 
• Wilfried de Brouwer 
• John J. Callahan 
• Raymond Duvall 
• Rodrigo Bravo Garrido 
• Julio Miguel Guerra 
• Richard F. Haines 
• Charles I. Halt 
• Oscar Santa Maria Huertas 
• Parviz Jafari 
• Denis Letty 
• James Penniston 
• Jose Carlos Pereira 
• John Podesta 
• Nick Pope 
• Ricardo Bermudez Sanhueza 
• Fife Symington III 
• Jean-Jacques Velasco 
• Alexander Wendt

What’s more, Kean wasn’t just quoting these people or telling them what to say. They personally wrote their accounts, their testimonies of what had happened, for this book.

She and these contributors acknowledge that just because it’s unexplained or unidentified doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s extraterrestrial. Rather, it supports the premise that the UFO phenomenon is there, it’s real. That unknown crafts are flying around demonstrating capabilities that defy the known laws of physics. This phenomenon just hasn’t been explained yet. She believes that UFOs will ultimately be resolved through an unbiased scientific investigation.

Articles

UFO Theorists Gain Support Abroad, but Repression at Home

This story details Kean’s coverage surrounding the COMETA Report and the implications it unexpectedly brought. It was first published in The Boston Globe on May 21, 2000.

The group behind the COMETA report called for international cooperation between France and interested countries, particularly the U.S., to address the UFO phenomenon strategically. However, the U.S. kept tight control over relevant UFO information, forbidding public disclosure of any unexplained sightings.

She clearly illustrated the tension between growing acceptance and calls for transparency abroad against the ongoing suppression and secrecy within the U.S. regarding the UFO phenomenon.

Glowing Auras and Black Money: The Pentagon’s Mysterious UFO Program

This NY Times article, Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious UFO Program, is co-written by Kean and fellow journalists Helene Cooper and Ralph Blumenthal. It’s an exposé that revealed the Pentagon had a secret UAP program, the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), and was hiding its $22M annual funding within the Department of Defense’s $600B budget.

The moment this was published on December 16, 2017, the public and media’s interest in UFOs and the government’s covert efforts to study them was ignited, only increasing as time passed by. 

It’s such a groundbreaking story that not only made Kean a leading reporter on UFOs but also helped make UFOs a more respected topic in the eyes of the public. 

Kean, Cooper, and Blumenthal have another story relevant to this one: 2 Navy Airmen and an Object That ‘Accelerated Like Nothing I’ve Ever Seen.’ The incident that the pilots featured in the story encountered also garnered public attention after its release.

Intelligence Officials Say U.S. Has Retrieved Craft of Non-Human Origin

On June 5, 2023, Kean and Blumenthal published the article, Intelligence Officials Say U.S. Has Retrieved Craft of Non-Human Origin, on The Debrief. It tells David Grusch’s story, an intelligence officer claiming that the U.S. government is secretly retrieving crafts and bodies of non-human origin.

The impact of this article was immediate. It received more than 2.7M views in the week of its release and led to a congressional hearing, headed by the U.S. House Oversight Subcommittee, on July 26, 2023.

Documentaries

UFOs: Investigating the Unknown

In this National Geographic docuseries, Kean becomes one of its consulting producers and on-camera experts. It’s a thought-provoking series that employs “a sound scientific and journalistic approach,” says one commenter, in its quest to find the truth behind the U.S. government’s UFO investigations.

Secret Access: UFOs on the Record

This 2011 History Channel documentary film is based on Kean’s book, UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record. It features the accounts of many of the book’s contributors and revisits some of the most significant UFO sightings in history.

Her Influence on the UFO/UAP Community

Leslie Kean earned her place in the UFO/UAP community not by looking for evidence that people like Avi Loeb do, but by documenting and verifying incidents through multiple credible sources. For example, interviewing high-profile officials and scientists who might otherwise be reluctant to discuss such topics.

Because of this, she’s able to:

• Bridge the gap between fringe UFO research and mainstream journalism, making the UFO phenomenon a serious scientific and national security discussion
• Inform the interested public of what has happened and is happening in the field of UFOs
• Make a significant shift from the government’s previous stance of dismissing or ignoring UFO reports (through her articles)

If you want to stay updated on credible UFO research and insights from thought leaders like Leslie Kean, visit UFO Connect today and explore the latest findings.

FAQ

What does she say about the government UFO secrecy?

Leslie Kean understands that authorities have a lot of reasons for keeping some information from the public. For a full disclosure to happen, she stated the government must do two things:

• Conduct serious studies that confirm the reports
• Show political will

What impact did her New York Times article have on UAP disclosure?

Leslie Kean saw that these articles sparked people’s interest in UFOs, opening doors for the topic to be taken seriously. We now have Congress members engaged in it, enabling them to be more open to the matter of disclosure.