When Wadleigh, a committed socialist, expressed the desire to act against growing the fascist movement in Europe, Nelson put him in touch with communists in Washington.
[citation needed] The defection of Trotsky and subsequent purges in 1937, as well as Wadleigh's work abroad, resulted in infrequent contacts.
[citation needed] Wadleigh stayed at the State Department in the 1940s but felt that his own career stalled because rumors lurked about his communist sympathies.
He shared an apartment in Rome with his brother, Richard Wadleigh, an Army intelligence officer who had led the First Armored Division into the city.
Wadleigh testified before a grand jury and the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), and was a key witness in the Hiss prosecution.
"[6] As federal prosecutor Thomas Murphy summed up, Wadleigh only wanted to stop the rise of fascism; "we all came to hate it, but he saw it earlier.
He said that he started spying in order to fight fascism but found increasing problems with Soviet efforts to enforce orthodoxy in science.