The Chinese surveillance vessel that floated across the U.S. at the start of 2023 fed information to China through an American internet service provider.

The spy balloon used the U.S. internet provider to get largely navigational data, Biden administration officials past and present told NBC News Thursday; however, the unnamed company disputed the allegation following its own investigation and discussion with federal officials.

According to the report, the Biden administration pursued a secretive court order from the federal Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to assemble intelligence about the spy balloon while it flew over the U.S. How the court ruled has not been revealed.

Chinese embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu told the outlet that the craft was a weather balloon that had flown off-course.

“As we had made it clear before, the airship, used for meteorological research, unintentionally drifted into U.S. because of the westerlies and its limited self-steering capability,” Mr. Liu said.

Congressional lawmakers, including Montana Sens. Steve Daines, a Republican, Jon Tester, a Democrat, and Rep. Matt Rosendale, a Republican, demanded answers from the Biden administration.

“Biden’s handling of the Chinese spy balloon has been nothing short of a violation of the Constitution,” said Mr. Rosendale. “He violated his oath of office by refusing to take the balloon down when it was spotted off the Aleutian Islands and allowed the Chinese Communist Party to collect sensitive military information and data on our civilian infrastructure for days. He violated his oath once again by allowing his Administration to lie to the American people about the balloon for months.”

The balloon entered American airspace over Alaska in late January, crossed into Canada and reentered American airspace before drifting across the country. Military fighter jets shot down the balloon off the South Carolina coast on Feb. 4.

The balloon was first spotted by the public in Montana after a pair of photojournalists in Montana shot an image of a “suspicious” object in the sky over Billings, The Daily Montanan reported.

At the time, President Biden and top Pentagon officials argued that downing the balloon over land could endanger American citizens and that the balloon offered few capabilities beyond what Chinese intelligence agencies already had collected from satellites in low Earth orbit.

“Reports now indicate that the Chinese spy balloon gathered intelligence from several sensitive military sites during its journey across the United States. But Joe Biden waited until it flew across the ENTIRE COUNTRY before doing anything,” 

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, said in a Twitter post at the time.

The Biden administration said its trip across sensitive sites in the American heartland was a spy mission.

The FBI analyzed the debris from the craft recovered in the ocean.

• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.