White House National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that the Chinese government’s claim that the United States flew surveillance balloons above their country was “absolutely not true.”
Discussing the three objects shot down over the weekend, Kirby said, “We are going to continue to share as much information with the American people as we can as we learn more about these objects. The truth is that we haven’t been able to gain access to the three that were shot down Friday, Saturday and yesterday, in large part because of the weather conditions. The third one, yesterday, was shot down over Lake Huron. It’s underwater. We’re going to do everything we can to recover them. As soon as we do that, we will be learning more about them and can share what we can learn with the American people.”
Co-host Jonathan Lemire asked, “I want to get your reaction to breaking news out of Beijing in the last hour or two. The foreign ministry accused the United States since 2022 of flying balloons ten different times over Chinese air space. Can you respond to that accusation?”
Kirby said, “Not true. Not doing it — just absolutely not true.”
Lemire said, “Let me push you further then. So the U.S. is not using these balloon technologies over China?”
Kirby said, “That is right. We are not flying balloons over China. That is absolutely true.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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