President Trump said he would have an “answer” in the coming days to the question of what happened to the growing list of scientists who have either died or disappeared in the past three years.
There is no evidence to suggest that their deaths and disappearances are linked, but conspiracy theories have circulated online to suggest this may be the case.
Asked if he believed the scientists’ fates were connected or random, Trump told reporters on Thursday: “Well I hope it’s random, but we’re going to know in the next week and a half.”
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“I just left a meeting on that subject,” he said outside the White House before departing for Las Vegas. “Pretty serious stuff … hopefully coincidence, or whatever you want to call it. Some of them were very important people, and we’re going to look at it over the next short period.”
The president added: “We’ll probably have a pretty good answer over the next week.”
After a reporter asked whether a “foreign adversary” in the US could have played a role, Trump pointed to his predecessor’s immigration policy. “Well, Biden had open borders. It wasn’t very hard to get here,” he replied.
During a White House briefing on Wednesday, a Fox News reporter asked Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, about ten scientists who had disappeared or died since mid-2024 and “reportedly had access to classified nuclear or aerospace material”.
Leavitt said that the Trump administration planned to look into the reports. “I haven’t spoken to our relevant agencies about it. I will certainly do that, and we’ll get you an answer. If true, of course, that’s definitely something I think this government administration would deem work worth looking into,” she said.
Steven Garcia, a 48-year-old government contractor, vanished last August in New Mexico, according to reports this week. Garcia was last seen leaving his Albuquerque home on foot and carrying a handgun, according to The Daily Mail. A source told the outlet that Garcia worked for the Kansas City National Security Campus, a federal site that produces non-nuclear material components for national defence systems, according to the US Department of Energy.
The Times has asked the security campus for confirmation of his employment.
In February, William Neil McCasland, a retired Air Force general, vanished. He was also last seen near his home in Albuquerque.
McCasland, 68, left his phone and glasses at home. His hiking boots, wallet and a .38 calibre revolver were not recovered, Bernalillo County sheriff’s office said last month, adding: “While there is currently no evidence indicating foul play, investigators are examining all available information as the case remains active.” The office noted it had not received any confirmed sighting or videos showing McCasland leaving the area.
According to the Air Force, McCasland was responsible for managing the military branch’s $2.2 billion science and technology programme.
Eric Burlison, a Republican congressman representing Missouri, posted on social media last month: “The disappearance of multiple scientists and military personnel with ties to advanced research is deeply concerning. I’ve already requested FBI involvement, and we will keep pressing for answers.”
Online amateur sleuths have linked the disappearances to the 2023 death of Michael David Hicks, a 59-year-old Nasa researcher. He served on the science teams of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test Project and the Nasa Deep Space 1 Mission, among others, according to the American Astronomical Society. His cause of death was listed as “arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease” and it was listed as “natural”. The case status is still open, according to Los Angeles county medical examiner records.
Also in Los Angeles, Monica Reza, 60, went missing last June while hiking in the Angeles National Forest. She had worked at Aerojet Rocketdyne, a defence and space manufacturer, for decades, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Other scientists who have disappeared include Jason Thomas, a Novartis biologist last seen in December, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory employees Anthony Chavez, 78, and Melissa Caslas, 45.
There is also speculation about the deaths of Frank Maiwald, a 61-year-old Nasa scientist, Nuno Loureiro, a 47-year-old Portuguese professor of nuclear science at MIT, and Carl Grillmair, a 67-year-old Canadian astrophysicist.
In February Freddy Snyder, 29, was charged with Grillmair’s murder in California. It was not clear if Snyder and Grillmair had any connection.
Cláudio Manuel Neves Valente, a 48-year-old who died by suicide after he allegedly killed two Brown University students last December, is believed to have also killed Loureiro.
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