Mike Gold Interview
Exclusive Interviews
Date: January 7, 2025
Role in Disclosure: Mike Gold was a member of NASA’s UAP Study Team (2022-2023); a principal witness for the congressional hearing Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth (November 2024)
Professional Bio: Mike Gold is an attorney who specializes in space policy. Gold has worked in the space industry for much of his career, including thirteen years at Bigelow Aerospace. He joined NASA in 2019 as the Associate Administrator for Space Policy and Partnerships, with a focus on negotiating norms of behavior in space and international agreements. He led the development and implementation of the Artemis Accords which, according to his LinkedIn description, “establish norms of behavior to ensure a peaceful and prosperous future in space for all of humanity.” Upon leaving NASA he became the Chief Growth Officer for Redwire Space, an aerospace company that is providing navigation equipment for NASA’s Artemis mission that aims to return humans to the Moon in the coming years. Mike Gold was a member of NASA’s UAP Study Team (2022-2023).
Justin Snead: So my first set of questions is on the NASA study team. The team’s recommendations in the final report were: get better data; crowdsourcing UAP data--there was talk of like a cell phone app potentially; improve FAA reporting; calibrate NASA satellite, telescope and sensors; do data processing, data mining; define the haystack, define the needle--a lot of talk of haystacks; and then destigmatize UAP. So those were the main recommendations in the report. And I know you don't work for NASA, but are you aware of any progress on any of those objectives that's been made in the last year since the report was released?
Mike Gold: Yeah. And to be clear, I don't work for NASA anymore, although, lord knows you never stop working for NASA, right, it's like the mafia. You try to escape and it draws you back in. There were a few things, one, and this hasn't been publicized, I'm not quite sure why, at least, best of my knowledge, the team was awarded the NASA Silver Group Achievement Medal, which was really kind, and I think important to acknowledge, particularly the sacrifices that a number of my colleagues made, where, as I said in my testimony, they were attacked viciously, in some cases, by their own colleagues in academia. And it was, I think, very kind and the right thing for NASA to do to acknowledge the sacrifices that members of the team made to participate with the Silver Group Achievement Award. So I could create kudos to NASA for having done that. So I appreciated that.
