Leading Republicans on the Senate Armed Services and Intelligence Committees are seeking more answers regarding how military officials alerted President Joe Biden about a Chinese spy balloon traveling over the U.S. last month.
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., ranking member on the Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, sent a letter Wednesday to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Politico reported.
That followed a similar letter they sent Feb. 8 to Austin and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines requesting a timeline of events that resulted in a fighter jet shooting down the balloon off South Carolina's coast on Feb. 4.
Although DoD policy chief Colin Kahl responded Feb. 27 — 10 days after the initial deadline passed — on behalf of Austin, the senators were not satisfied with his response.
Kahl told the senators that the Defense Department hoped previous congressional briefings answered their questions. But in their new letter, Rubio and Wicker said they were disappointed a "subordinate" answered their initial request.
"In particular, we await documentation demonstrating when senior officials learned of the balloon and at what point you, and the President, were provided response options. The simple point of the letter was to establish baseline facts to inform all members of Congress," the senators wrote.
In their initial letter, Wicker and Rubio wrote they believe Gen. Glen VanHerck, the head of U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command, notified his chain of command on Jan. 28 when the balloon was over the Aleutian Islands.
But the senators suspect that Austin learned of the balloon a few days later, when it had traveled over Alaska, Canada, and returned to U.S. airspace.
On Wednesday, Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., a member of the House Armed Services Committee, asked VanHerck whether the military waited to brief the president until citizens noticed the balloon.
"Congressman, I can't answer that question because I didn't specifically discuss that with the White House," VanHerck said during a hearing on security challenges in North and South America, Politico reported.
VanHerck added that when the balloon was spotted in late January, he assessed there was no "hostile intent."
Rubio and Wicker also slammed Kahl for disclosing previously classified information about Chinese surveillance balloons during the Trump administration.
"It remains unclear whether this leak was cleared internally through the proper channels. Either way, it was a brazen attempt to shift blame," the senators wrote to Austin.
"Most egregiously, Dr. Kahl omitted a key detail in his distribution of this sensitive information to the press — the prior Chinese balloons were only discovered much later. The Trump administration did not have an opportunity to respond at the time."
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