Since the 2017 release of three naval aviation videos of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) craft, congressional national security committees have struggled to understand the broader implications of these objects. Congress has adopted multiple rounds of legislation meant to get to the bottom of this enigma. Their efforts have been impeded by the military and intelligence community. Today's pushback has its origins in historic UFO policies. Many of these policies were established by a CIA secret panel which declared that the public's interest in UFOs will "result in a threat to the orderly functioning of the protective organs of the body politic."

Threat to the Body Politic is a historical analysis of official efforts to understand these anomalous craft, up through today's congressional interest. Beginning in 1953, the CIA and Air Force combined to develop policies to denigrate UAP witnesses who challenged the official narrative that all UFO sightings were the product of mistaken identity, delusion, or hoax. Psychological warfare methods were used on Americans to hide evidence and "debunk" those who documented this mystery. Using declassified records and the testimony of government officials, Threat to the Body Politic shows how these secretive efforts began and continue to this day. The Book also recommends steps to help Congress understand the broader implications of UAP, whether man-made or not.

Author James P. Lough is a retired government lawyer who wrote The UFO Briefing Book: A Congressional Guide to the UAP Phenomenon (March 2020). It predicted the need for Congress to enact multiple mandates intended to strip away the secrecy around a subject that is both publicly derided and highly classified.