Plain-English guides to major U.S. government file releases — the Justice Department's Epstein files and the Pentagon's 2026 UFO files, plus the National Archives, AARO, NASA and FBI records behind them. Every guide is being rebuilt so that each claim is checked against the original record and cited. Source-verified guides are listed first, with their sources at the end of each page.
Every official Epstein files release in one place: the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the December 2025 releases, the 3.5-million-page January 30, 2026 release, what was redacted or withheld, and where to read the files on justice.gov.
What the Epstein Files Transparency Act requires: who voted for it, the 30-day deadline, what the Justice Department may and may not withhold, and what has happened since it became law on November 19, 2025.
A practical guide to the Justice Department's Epstein Library at justice.gov/epstein: the age check, the 12 data sets, court records, FOIA and House disclosures, how search works and its limits.
The official record of the Epstein and Maxwell cases: the 2019 federal indictment, Epstein's death in custody and the Inspector General's findings, Maxwell's 2021 conviction and 20-year sentence, and the July 2025 DOJ/FBI memo.
Jeffrey Epstein's 2008 Florida plea and federal non-prosecution agreement, and what the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility concluded in November 2020: 'poor judgment' but no professional misconduct.
The House Committee on Oversight's Epstein investigation: the August 2025 subpoenas, the 33,295 pages of DOJ records released September 2, 2025, the Epstein estate records released September 8, 2025, and the interview transcripts released in 2026.
What the Justice Department has officially said about an Epstein 'client list': the July 2025 DOJ/FBI memo, the February 14, 2026 report to Congress listing officials named in the files 'at least once', and the June 2026 court ruling on redactions.
What the Epstein flight logs are, which official releases include them (the DOJ's February 27, 2025 'First Phase' and the 2025–2026 Transparency Act releases), how to find them in the DOJ Epstein Library, and how to read them responsibly.
The Department of War's seventh PURSUE release: 28 documents including the AAWSAP contractor's 2010 Utah ranch investigation report, a 2026 AARO memo and FBI interview on a triangular UAP, 1950s Air Force reports and a 1963 White House memo on recovering space debris.
The Department of War's sixth PURSUE release: 75 files (59 PDFs, 15 videos, 1 audio) including 44 AAWSAP program records, Project Blue Book's Tremonton film file, Edward Ruppelt's 1952 talk, and new military and police UAP videos.
Steven Spielberg's Disclosure Day is fiction — but it was inspired by real events. Here is what is invented, what is real, and where to read the actual government UFO files.
What the CIA's declassified U-2 history (released 2013) says about Area 51 and Groom Lake, and why a CIA historian concluded spy-plane flights explained over half of UFO reports from the late 1950s through the 1960s.
What the National Archives' Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Records Collection (RG 615) is, the law that created it, how records arrive, and step-by-step how to search and download them.
What NASA's UAP Independent Study Team, chaired by David Spergel, concluded in its September 14, 2023 report — data quality, stigma, crowdsourcing, ASRS — and what NASA did next.
What is in the FBI's UFO files: the March 22, 1950 Guy Hottel memo (the most viewed record in the FBI Vault) and what the FBI says about it, the 1947 Roswell teletype, and where to read the files.
The Phoenix Lights of March 13, 1997 in the record: two separate sightings, the Maryland Air National Guard's explanation of the flares dropped over the Barry M. Goldwater Range, and what Arizona's governor said in 1997 and again in 2007.
The 2004 USS Nimitz "Tic Tac" encounter in the official record: Cmdr. David Fravor's sworn testimony to Congress in July 2023, and the Pentagon's April 2020 release of the FLIR1 video, which it still classes as unidentified.
The three Navy UAP videos the Pentagon released on April 27, 2020 — what the DoD and Navy said, where the official files are, and NASA's 2023 analysis of GoFast (about 13,000 ft and roughly 40 mph).
Britain's best-known UFO case in the official record: Lt Col Charles Halt's January 1981 memo, the Ministry of Defence file DEFE 24/1948 released by The National Archives in 2009, and the MoD's conclusion that the incident was of "no defence significance."
The government's 2026 UFO file releases explained: what PURSUE is, why President Trump ordered it, all seven release dates and file counts from the official war.gov database, and how to see the files yourself.
The July 1952 Washington UFO flap in the official record: radar blips over the capital, jets scrambled, a White House inquiry, the Air Force's temperature-inversion explanation, and the CIA study it triggered.
The Belgian UFO wave in the official record: the Belgian Air Force's F-16 scramble of March 1990, General Wilfried de Brouwer's statement in the UK Ministry of Defence files, and the famous triangle photo that its maker later admitted was faked.
The Roswell incident in the government's own records: the 1947 FBI teletype, the GAO's 1995 records search, the Air Force's 1994 Project Mogul finding and its 1997 'Case Closed' report on the alien-body stories.
Project Blue Book in the official record: 12,618 UFO sightings investigated from 1947 to 1969, 701 left 'Unidentified', why the Air Force closed it, and where the files are at the National Archives.
What AARO's 2024 Report on the Historical Record of U.S. Government Involvement with UAP actually concluded about extraterrestrial technology, reverse-engineering claims, KONA BLUE, AAWSAP and the alleged alloy sample.
What former intelligence officer David Grusch told Congress under oath on July 26, 2023 about a "multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program," and how the Pentagon and AARO responded.
Kenneth Arnold's June 1947 sighting of nine objects near Mount Rainier, as described in the CIA's 1997 history of its UFO work and AARO's 2024 historical report, and how it gave the world the term "flying saucer."
A plain-English walkthrough of the June 25, 2021 ODNI Preliminary Assessment on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena: 144 reports, one explained, 18 incidents with unusual flight characteristics, and the five explanation categories.
The December 9, 1965 Kecksburg, Pennsylvania fireball in the record: Project Blue Book's meteor finding, the reports of an acorn-shaped object, and the FOIA lawsuit that forced NASA to search its files.
How the Pentagon's $22 million AAWSAP program (2009–2012) came to study a Utah ranch, what AARO's 2024 report says it produced, and how AATIP differs from AAWSAP.
Bob Lazar's 1989 claims about alien craft at a site he called S-4 near Area 51, set against the official record: the CIA's declassified Area 51 history, AARO's 2024 finding on reverse-engineering claims, and what science later learned about element 115.
56 more guides are being rewritten from primary sources and will appear here once checked.
We'll email you when the government releases new Epstein files or Pentagon UFO files — with a link to our sourced explainer.