Donald Trump loves himself some conspiracy theories. But this week, the 79-year-old president offered a new excuse for why he keeps reviving some of the most debunked election fantasies of the past decade, including the infamous “Italygate” saga.
Late Wednesday night, Trump brought back the claim that Italian military satellites helped hack U.S. voting machines during the 2020 election and helped flip votes from him to Joe Biden.
The theory has been dismissed by experts and has faded into the darker corners of the internet. That was until Trump decided to give it new life in 2026 on Truth Social.
One of his reposts alleged that China coordinated the operation and the CIA oversaw it. Plus, the post also said that the FBI covered it up to install Biden as a “puppet.” However, as always, there was no evidence.
Italygate first emerged in late 2020 and was pushed by far-right and QAnon-aligned figures. They claimed voting machines were remotely manipulated and linked to the U.S. Embassy in Rome and an Italian defense contractor. Fact-checkers at PBS have also labeled the claims as baseless, and no credible investigation has been found otherwise.
Trump reposts theory that Italian military satellites zapped his 2020 victory away after FBI seizure of Georgia ballotshttps://t.co/nGPjV5nGQR
— Talking Points Memo (@TPM) January 30, 2026
Still, the conspiracy reached Trump’s inner circle. In December 2020, then–Chief of Staff Mark Meadows forwarded a letter about the Italygate theory to acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, as he wanted the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate. Rosen’s aides brushed it off as “pure insanity,” and DOJ never pursued it.
In 2026, NBC News anchor Tom Llamas asked Trump why he promotes election conspiracies he doesn’t believe. That’s when Trump insisted he wasn’t endorsing them and that he just sometimes “retruthed” such claims, even if he didn’t think they were true.
While Trump wasn’t denying responsibility for spreading misinformation, he acted like he had simply shared a viral rumor. Except this repost proved how much he distrusts democracy in itself.
Recently, there was also news of an FBI seizure of 2020 ballots in Georgia which only validated Trump’s election fraud claims. Alongside the Italygate reposts, Trump alos warned “this is only the beginning” and that prosecutions are coming soon. As of the time of writing, there is no evidence supporting such conclusions.
He also resurrected some conspiracies about the 2016 election. One of his reposts accused former President Barack Obama of falsifying intelligence and conspiring with foreign powers to overthrow the U.S. government. Critics, on the other hand, have said this claim is logically incoherent, as Obama was the sitting president at the time anyway.
DNI Tulsi Gabbard “has begun studying information about voting machines, analyzed data from swing states and pursued theories that President Trump has promoted to claim the 2020 election was unfairly taken from him…” https://t.co/U2pujwO5QG pic.twitter.com/wxsH3CW5iY
— Eric Geller (@ericgeller) January 29, 2026
For years, Trump has been insisting that the 2020 election (particularly in Georgia) was rigged. Courts and audits have rejected those claims repeatedly, too. With the latest reposts, do you think truth matters on Truth Social?
