Washington, DC (CNN) It ain't easy being friends with Donald Trump.

Australia, Britain, and Italy are being sucked into the conspiracy-filled quagmire of impeachment-era Washington, after Trump and his Attorney General William Barr reportedly leaned on friendly governments to assist a probe widely seen as intended to discredit the FBI's investigation into the 2016 elections.

Trump enlisted Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison's help over the phone, and now he's already under fire at home.** Critics say his desperation to be mates with Trump is taking Australia into dangerous territory, and the flap has limited Morrison's political dividend from his big state dinner at the White House last month.

This story was originally published in the October 2 edition of CNN's "Meanwhile in America" newsletter. Subscribe to this email or share with a friend by clicking here.

Normally there'd be nothing to see here -- US attorneys general huddle with foreign counterparts all the time. But Trump and Barr appear to be chasing a conservative media concoction that US allies plotted with rogue American spies to thwart him in the 2016 elections (a claim shot down by the British government in 2017.)

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