Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), the chairman of the defense appropriations subcommittee, announced on Friday a hearing on the Chinese balloon suspected of spying on nuclear military sites in Montana.
The Pentagon announced the balloon's presence over Tester's home state on Thursday, though President Joe Biden was made aware of the aircraft two days earlier. The Pentagon advised the White House not to shoot down the balloon, reasoning that it does not pose a "military or physical threat to people on the ground," according to U.S. defense officials.
The incursion, which led Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a trip to China, sparked bipartisan outrage.
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"I’m demanding answers from the Biden Administration. I will be pulling people before my committee to get real answers on how this happened, and how we can prevent it from ever happening again," Tester said in a Friday statement.
The discovery of the balloon exacerbates already tense relations between the United States and China. In the first weeks of the new Congress, the House prioritized bills targeting the Chinese Communist Party and stood up a select committee to counter its growing influence.
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