In this, the most dangerous period since World War II, the Biden administration should have been more forthcoming about the threat China's incursion posed to our homeland.  

Transparency builds trust, especially during a geopolitical crisis. But during a critical moment with Beijing, President Biden and his national security team chose to mislead the public about the steps they took to counter an adversarial asset over our homeland.

I have pressed the Biden administration to provide the facts essential to understanding of this challenge: What was the Pentagon's initial threat assessment of the first balloon, and when was it conducted? When was the secretary of Defense informed? What about the president? 

Press reports have been more reliable in answering these questions than the Biden administration's own tight-lipped accounting.

What we do know should give us pause. I asked Gen. VanHerck, the NORAD chief, about these questions in a public hearing in March. He testified that he still does not know when the president was made aware of the balloon and that he was not allowed to provide response options to the White House until five days after he first spotted it. When I asked Secretary Austin, he also gave an unsatisfactory response, repeating many of the same interagency talking points. This is hardly the hallmark of a dedicated effort from the Pentagon to be forthcoming with Congress.