Barack Obama’s podcast remark that aliens are “real” went viral, but he clarified he was speaking about statistical possibility, not evidence.
He denied any secret facilities or extraterrestrial contact during his presidency, rejecting Area 51 conspiracy theories.
Scientists still have no confirmed proof of alien life despite decades of research and signal analysis.
Former US President Barack Obama returned to the limelight for stirring global curiosity as he said aliens are “real” during an interview with Brian Tyler Cohen on the No Lie podcast. The podcast was posted on Saturday, 14 February 2026. He then added that he has seen no proof of their existence yet or of their visit to Earth.
During the podcast, Obama was asked about the existence of aliens in a rapid-fire questioning round. Obama said, “They’re real, but I haven’t seen them… and they’re not being kept in Area 51.” He then clarified that there is no hidden underground facility unless “there’s this enormous conspiracy and they hid it from the president of the United States.”
Talks on space and conspiracy have always been major topics of discussion that interest people, and such a remark from Obama himself made it to international media while circulating on social media. However, the media added its own touch with sensationalized headlines that gave rise to speculation suggesting that the former president had confirmed extraterrestrials.
All the fiasco prompted a quick response from Obama as he issued a clarification on social media regarding his statement. He said that he was not pointing toward anything or giving any evidence but was speaking statistically. He He then added that there are low chances of any aliens visiting Earth as he “saw no evidence during [his] presidency that extraterrestrials have made contact with us.”
There is a place called Area 51 in Nevada which continuously gets linked to UFO conspiracy theories along with alleged alien storage facilities. It was actually a base which records suggest was used for testing advanced reconnaissance aircraft, including the U-2 and A-12 Oxcart spy planes, as acknowledged by US authorities in 2013 through declassified documents. These experimental aircraft were mistaken as unidentified flying objects by civilians, resulting in an unintentional increase in UFO reports in the 1950s and 1960s.
There was even a social media campaign to “storm Area 51” launched in 2019 with about 150 participants that made the base a viral topic online that year. There were some arrests made in the whole fiasco. The US government started referring to UFOs as Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAPs) as the Pentagon created the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) to investigate sightings. However, the majority of the public in the US believed that the authorities are hiding information related to UFOs.
There has been no scientific evidence that would confirm the existence of extraterrestrial life. Scientists are still working on the project, searching through radio telescopes and signal analysis to examine the data from the Arecibo Observatory. One such project was launched in 1999 and called SETI@home.
The observatory collapsed in 2020, but there have been over 12 billion signals identified across two decades of observation that seem to be related. The signals are being re-examined, but none confirm the existence of alien intelligence so far.
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