ABC News (22 Sep 2018) reported that Papadopoulos had suggested on Twitter that Downer was an MI6 operative and that Downer’s companion was ASIS. Those are Papadopoulos’s allegations. This site does not adopt them as fact. The same piece quoted Papadopoulos: “I have no recollection, whatsoever, talking about emails.” That is his denial of a specific detail. It is not a court finding about the meeting.
In May 2019 Downer told Sky News Australia he did not go to the meeting expecting Russia talk and denied the purpose was to launch an FBI probe. Fox News (Brooke Singman, 10 May 2019) and the Daily Caller (9 May 2019) recapped that interview: he pushed back on claims he tried to trap Papadopoulos. Epoch Times (May 2019) ran the same denial under the headline that the meeting was not a set-up. That is Downer’s response. It is not a finding that Papadopoulos invented the complaint.
Papadopoulos later pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI about contacts with Joseph Mifsud—a separate criminal case. That plea is not a finding that Downer trapped him, and it is not a finding that the wine-bar conversation happened as either man later told it.