The information was assessed by Defense Department intelligence analysts in summer 2020 but was not passed over to the President or his office because it was not clear what the objects actually were, the report said. The objects monitored then were smaller than the Chinese balloon shot down off the coast of South Carolina on February 4 and they flew at a much lower level, the Journal said.
Mark Esper, Trump's secretary of defense in 2019-2020, told the Journal he did not recall ever being briefed about such incidents. Former national security adviser Robert O'Brien told the Journal that the recent balloons were very different in nature from the Trump era sightings, according to a briefing he had just received from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
In 2022, the Defense Department set up at the direction of Congress, a new classified All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO. Previously, US Navy aircraft repeatedly encountered mysterious flying objects over the Eastern Seaboard, sometimes for months at a time dating back to President Barack Obama's time in office from 2009 to 2017, the Journal said.
Both Republicans and Democrats in Congress led by Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Marco Rubio are trying to get increased funding approved for the AARO in order to let it work more effectively, the Journal reported.