Getty Images/Huffington Post Illustration Hillary Clinton has let it be known this past year that she's very interested in the subject of UFOs.

It’s not every day that a leading politician demonstrates any interest in UFOs and the possibility of alien visitors to Earth. Even more intriguing when that person happens to be the Democratic nominee for president.

Hillary Clinton is definitely interested in UFOs. As is her campaign chairman, John Podesta ― we saw more evidence of that in the WikiLeaks trove of alleged campaign emails.

One hacked email in particular claims that Clinton “was very disappointed” when late night host Jimmy Kimmel didn’t ask her about UFOs last November.

Following Clinton’s appearance on that show, Podesta emailed her deputy communications director, Kristina Schake, to ask how the interview went.

“He didn’t end up asking her about UFOs! She was very disappointed,” Schake responded. “She practiced UAPs for 5 minutes beforehand.”

He didn’t end up asking her about UFOs! She was very disappointed. A campaign aide's email discussing Hillary Clinton's November 2015 appearance on Jimmy Kimmel's show

This was a very telling response. First, it indicated how comfortable Clinton was with the idea of talking about UFOs before a national audience. The second intriguing part of Schake’s email was the reference to “UAPs.”

UAP stands for “unidentified aerial phenomena,” a term that began seeping into American UFO culture with the creation of the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena in 1999. (Co-founder Richard Haines is a former NASA research scientist and onetime chief of NASA’s Space Human Factors Office.) NARCAP is an international organization that researches and documents aviation safety-related encounters with UAP.

Evidently, Clinton knew the term and had even practiced talking about it before not getting the chance to do so on Kimmel’s 2015 show. But that was then. Fast forward to March 2016, when Clinton returned to talk with Kimmel. This time, he initiated a discussion about UFOs.

Clinton didn’t miss the chance to bring up the newer acronym UAP. The only problem ― despite all that practicing four months earlier ― was that she didn’t quite get the term right. Again, it’s “unidentified aerial phenomena.”

“You know, there’s a new name. It’s unexplained aerial phenomenon ― UAP ― that’s the latest nomenclature,” she said.

Clinton went on to tell Kimmel ― and America ― that, if elected president, she would “go into those files and, hopefully, make as much of that public as possible. If there’s nothing there, let’s tell people there’s nothing there. If there is something there, unless it’s a threat to national security, I think we ought to share it with the public.”

Both Clinton and Podesta have mentioned this year that he has urged her to declassify UFO files if she becomes the commander in chief.

During a December 2015 campaign stop in New Hampshire, the Conway Daily Sun asked Clinton whether she thinks Earth is the target of alien visitors. “I think we may have been [visited already]. We don’t know for sure,” she said.

She also told the paper of Podesta’s interest. “He has made me personally pledge we are going to get the information out. One way or another.”

Of course, Jimmy Kimmel’s show isn’t the only way the Democratic nominee could reach out to millions of voters ― including many UFO believers ― with her views on the possibility of alien life. Would she object to being asked her opinion at this week’s debate with Donald Trump?

Certainly one major obstacle to that subject coming anywhere near the debate is the reality that most news organizations and many Americans don’t consider UFOs “real” enough to address in a serious setting. And the final presidential debate is probably best spent discussing the issues that face American voters every day.

But it would be interesting to watch a UFO question unfold. Because if debate moderator Chris Wallace asks Clinton her thoughts on otherworldly visitors, regardless of how she answers, Trump would undoubtedly be allowed to respond.

Anyone out there have a direct line to Wallace before Wednesday’s debate?