White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre had a difficult time trying to explain how the North American Aerospace Defense Command works in the aftermath of American F-22 fighter jets shooting down an aerial object over Canada.
"Why is the American military shooting something out of the sky over Canada?" MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart asked Jean-Pierre on Sunday.
"Because it's part of NORAD. There's, uh, the NORAD is part of like a, part of a—it's a, it's a, what you call, a coalition, a consortium, a pact, exactly! We didn't do it in our own, we did it, uh, clearly in step with Canadia. Canada," Jean-Pierre tried to explain.
Karine Jean-Pierre says the U.S. military shot an object over Canada "because it's part of NORAD. There's, uh, the NORAD is part of like a, part of a—it's a, it's a, what you call, a coalition, a consortium."
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) February 12, 2023
"We did it clearly in step with CANADIA." pic.twitter.com/X1CmWnR2ns
"Following a call between the Prime Minister of Canada and the President of the United States, President Biden authorized U.S. fighter aircraft assigned to North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) to work with Canada to take down a high-altitude airborne object over northern Canada today. NORAD detected the object over Alaska late Friday evening. Two F-22 aircraft from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska monitored the object over U.S. airspace with the assistance of Alaska Air National Guard refueling aircraft, tracking it closely and taking time to characterize the nature of the object," Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said on Saturday.
"Monitoring continued today as the object crossed into Canadian airspace, with Canadian CF-18 and CP-140 aircraft joining the formation to further assess the object," Ryder continued. "A U.S. F-22 shot down the object in Canadian territory using an AIM 9X missile following close coordination between U.S. and Canadian authorities, to include a call today between Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and Minister of Defence Anita Anand. As Canadian authorities conduct recovery operations to help our countries learn more about the object, the Federal Bureau of Investigation will be working closely with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police."
Another unidentified airborne object was shot over Lake Huron by an F-16 on Sunday, bringing the total airborne objects being shot down over North American airspace to four.
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