Surveillance balloons flew over the US at least three times during the Trump administration, according to the White House

Chinese surveillance balloon A senior Biden administration official said Sunday night that the plane had flown over the United States at least three times during the Trump administration, but the information wasn’t discovered until after Trump resigned.

Biden administration officials on Monday declined to say when or how they learned about the balloons. was.

General Glenn Vanherk, commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command, said, “I can tell you that we did not detect those threats.” It’s a domain awareness gap that must be

Former President Donald Trump said fox news “It never happened under Trump,” he said. A Chinese official on Monday referred to Trump’s denials.

China, meanwhile, said the balloon spotted last week was an off-course weather balloon and said the US response was “unacceptable” and an “overreaction”.

chinese balloon first entered U.S. airspace After flying over or near four military test sites in Montana, Wyoming, Nebraska, and Missouri on January 28, shot down on saturday Off the coast of South Carolina.

President Joe Biden and other senior government officials said the president wanted to shoot it down sooner, but was advised by Pentagon leaders to wait until it was on the water to limit the damage.

Biden insisted on Monday that the discovery of the balloon would not hurt relations between the United States and China.

“We made it clear to China what we were going to do,” he said. “They understand our position. We are not going to back down.”

Chinese officials confirmed on Monday that a balloon flying over Latin America also originated from China, but said it was also a weather balloon.

Eleanor Watson contributed to this report.