Well, per this article in the Asbury Park Press today (Jan. 29, 2025), the Trump administration has revealed those mystery drones over New Jersey had been authorized by the FAA for “research and various other reasons …”

https://www.app.com/story/news/local/new-jersey/2025/01/29/trump-drones-new-jersey-over-nj-faa/78005759007/

And do you know what this smells like to me?

Top secret Pentagon research and development involving testing and training for classified technologies.

This would explain why the FAA didn’t tell anyone the flights were authorized for research: perhaps the agency wasn’t permitted to divulge this because it was classified by the Pentagon.

Maybe that’s not what it was, but statements from the Trump administration seem to indicate that some of the flights were initially for some sort of official and authorized purpose.

Here are some of the most relevant bits from the Asbury Park Press article, bold and in brackets:

[That statement raised numerous questions about why the FAA did not tell the FBI and law enforcement officers that the flights had been authorized by them, or why the FAA did not acknowledge that they had authorized the drone flights.

“The drones that were flying over New Jersey in large numbers were authorized to be flown by FAA for research and various other reasons … this was not the enemy,” Trump said in a written statement read by Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt at the first press briefing of the new administration.

There was no further explanation as to what “research and various other reasons” the FAA had authorized.

When asked why the FAA never revealed it authorized the drones to fly for research purposes, FAA spokesman Christopher Mullooly on Tuesday referred the matter to the White House for its official statement. He added for background that the FAA’s role is to ensure drones operate safely within the broader National Airspace System and said it is legal to operate drones under 400 feet while complying with all rules, including avoiding restricted airspace and other aircraft.]

So, there you have it.

Yet further evidence that the UFOs we’ve been seeing for decades stem from Pentagon R&D, not E.T.