Trump defends wife's speech writer amid plagiarism claims
A writer took responsibility for the "chaos, confusion and hysteria" caused by a speech given by Donald Trump's wife that drew accusations of plagiarism and cast a shadow over the party's convention this week.
Meredith McIver, a staff writer for the Trump Organization, apologized and offered an explanation that contrasted with two days of efforts by the Trump campaign to deny there had been a problem with Melania Trump's speech on Monday night.
McIver, a 65-year-old New Yorker who has written numerous "how to get rich" books with the billionaire, is a registered Democrat, according to the New York Daily News.
In a statement McIver apologised, writing "I offered my resignation to Mr Trump and the Trump family, but they rejected it".
However, it looks as though the speech writer will keep her job, with the Republican presidential candidate making the most of the bad situation.
The Republicans' convention in Cleveland, which formally anointed Trump on Tuesday as the party nominee for the November 8 presidential election, was meant to be an occasion for the party to rally around its unorthodox White House candidate after a bitterly divisive primary campaign.
But the accusations of plagiarism, and the Trump campaign's responses to them, have been a major talking point just as the party tries to showcase both a candidate who can appeal to voters, and a campaign operation capable of beating Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in November.
McIver addmitted she had inserted passages into the Melania Trump speech that resembled parts of a 2008 speech by first lady Michelle Obama.
“I did not check Mrs. Obama’s speeches. This was my mistake and I feel terrible for the chaos I have caused Melania and the Trumps, as well as to Mrs. Obama. No harm was meant,” McIver said.
She said Melania Trump had read passages from Michelle Obama’s speech to the 2008 Democratic National Convention, when Barack Obama was campaigning for the presidency, over the phone to her as examples. McIver then wrote them down and later included some of the phrasing in a draft that became Melania Trump's speech.
McIver said in her statement that Michelle Obama is a person Melania Trump "has always liked.”
"I apologize for the confusion and hysteria my mistake caused," she wrote.
Democrats said the speech and the Trump campaign's various explanations over the next 48 hours showed his team was not ready for prime time. The charge was all the more embarrassing because Trump has repeatedly slammed Clinton as untrustworthy.
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