The Senator, who is a SETI proponent and a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is a powerful ally of Mulder's providing him with top-secret information and protecting him from re-criminations from his enemies. He has supplied Mulder with information pertaining to alien contact at the SETI monitoring station in Arecibo, Puerto Rico and that he has 24 hours to confirm contact before a Blue Beret UFO Retrieval Team can be dispatched. "What am I looking for?" Mulder asks. "Contact", relies the Senator.