Sen. Chuck Schumer pushing bill to allow local law enforcement agencies to investigate drones

NEW YORK (WPVI) -- Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was blocked Wednesday from quickly advancing a bill that would allow local law enforcement agencies to track aerial drones, ensuring Congress won't act this year on the mysterious drone sightings that have bewildered residents of New Jersey and across the eastern U.S.

"The federal government just doesn't have the ability to go to every corner in America and see whether the drones are safe or not safe," Schumer said.

Schumer, a New York Democrat, sought to speed a bipartisan bill through the Senate by seeking unanimous consent on the floor, but Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, objected to its passage.

"The people in New York and New Jersey have a lot of questions, and they're not getting good enough answers," said Schumer. "The utter confusion surrounding these drone sightings shows that the feds can't respond all on their own."

Over 5,000 drone sightings have been reported in recent weeks, most of them on the East Coast and particularly in New Jersey.

Schumer has also called for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to deploy better drone-tracking technology to identify the drones and their operators.

The Senate bill would have also enhanced some federal agencies' authority to act on drones, as well as started a pilot program to allow states and local authorities to disrupt, disable or seize a drone without prior consent of the operator.

"This bill would ensure that law enforcement has the technology needed to quickly and clearly identify exactly what the reported sightings of drones across the country actually are," said Sen. Gary Peters, a Michigan Democrat who sponsored the bipartisan bill.

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The FBI and Homeland Security have issued statements saying the drones don't pose a threat to National Security, but there has still been very little explanation about what's in the sky, whether it's recreational activity or misidentified manned aircraft.

Some U.S. political leaders, including Trump, have called for much stronger action against the drones, including shooting them down.

Sen. Rand Paul has other thoughts on the Schumer's proposed bill, calling it a "government overreach."

"So in order to look at the information that might be coming to a drone, it maybe that you're capturing all the information of everybody surrounding an airport or everybody who lives near an airport," Paul said. "Once you have all that data, what are the assurances that the government isn't looking at your data, in addition to the data maybe related to flying a drone."

Paul's objection was enough to block a vote on the Senate floor.

However, Schumer acknowledged he will keep doing everything to push it through.

"I met with Sen. Paul, and I said I still don't think your objections are real," Schumer said.

The Associated Press contributed to this post.