Former Attorney General Bill Bar, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and CIA Director Gina Haspel all visited Rome, Italy, within weeks of each other in the late summer/fall of 2019 – with Barr actually visiting twice.
Barr visited Rome on August 15 and then again on September 27. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited on October 2 and Haspel on October 9.
Barr had reportedly been investigating allegations of the possible involvement of Italian intelligence officers, or other officers acting within Italy, in SpyGate – the beginnings of the investigation of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and the Russian government.
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte reportedly assured Barr that no such involvement took place.
Italian journalist Stefano Feltri asked at the time, “If Conte proved to Barr on September 24th that nothing had happened in Italy in 2016, why did CIA director come to Rome two weeks later?”
Facts are emerging that paint a picture of Italian involvement in not one, but both of the defining scandals of Donald Trump’s presidency: SpyGate and the 2020 election. Read more here and here.
Photo by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons