In an interview earlier today, July 20, with CNN’s Chris Cuomo, the campaign chairman for Donald Trump, Paul Manafort, again denied allegations of plagiarism in the speech delivered by Melania Trump Monday night.
By now, most of America and the world know that the speech delivered by Melania Trump at the Republican Convention not only bore a striking resemblance to Michelle Obama’s speech in 2012, but in fact had three full passages lifted from it.
The matching sections have been reviewed by experts and all agree that this bares the markings of flat out plagiarism.
CNN edited passages of the two addresses in a side-by-side segment, showing blatant copying of whole passages from the address delivered eight years earlier by Michelle Obama.
WATCH: Melania Trump's speech plagiarizes passage from Michelle Obama's 2008 speech https://t.co/Dcffhp2Dpghttps://t.co/8uizLfaLWH
— CNN (@CNN) July 19, 2016
On Tuesday, when asked about the passages that had clearly been copied from the First Lady’s speech delivered at the Democratic Convention in 2008, Paul Manafort quickly deflected, saying:
“This is once again an example of when a woman threatens Hillary Clinton, she seeks out to demean her and take her down. It’s not going to work against Melania Trump.”
Questions continued to swirl around the allegations throughout the day Tuesday, and answers out of the campaign’s communication team were erratic and contradictory. In an interview with Matt Lauer Monday, Mrs. Trump had claimed she had written the speech herself “with little help” from others.
However, when questions began to arise early Tuesday morning, the communications team released a statement asserting that an entire team of writers had assisted Melania Trump in organizing the speech.
Firing a barrage of questions towards Trump’s campaign chairman though, Cuomo challenged Paul Manafort on denials of the what is now considered by most professionals a clear case of plagiarism.
He also wondered if whether these types of communication tactics could be expected throughout the campaign or in a Trump administration. Cuomo said:
“Some of those words came from Michelle Obama’s speech in 2008. You have every kind of expert and anybody with eyes who sees that, you keep ignoring it. I don’t understand why. I don’t understand why you keep making this an issue.”
Manafort replied:
“Because it is a speech that she gave, talking about her feelings. She is not a candidate for office.”
Pressing Manafort further, Cummo railed against the campaign and the shadowy tactics, not only in this case, but throughout the campaign:
“When faced with something that you did wrong, you just deny it, no matter whether it is true or not. Whether it is the man who has a developmental disability who works for The New York Times, and Donald Trump mocks him and says, ‘No, I didn’t.’ Whether it is a star that represents the star of David, and you say, ‘No, it is a sheriff’s star.’ There is a pattern, whether it is Baron, John Miller, really Donald Trump. There is a pattern of denying the obvious. What happens when you’re running the government of the United States and you don’t want to deal with what happens then? That’s the concern.”
Watch the epic showdown here:
