Halper played a central role in a scandal in the 1980 election. But it was not until several years after Reagan's victory over Carter that this scandal emerged. In connection with his position Halper's name came up in the 1983/4 investigations into the Debategate affair, which was a spying scandal in which Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officials passed classified information about Carter administration's foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in order to ensure the Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was considering (Iran hostage crisis). Reagan Administration officials cited by "The New York Times" described Halper as "the person in charge" of the operation. Halper called the report "just absolutely untrue".