Ms McIver attempted to explain the similarities with a Michelle Obama speech in 2008: “Over the phone, she read me some passages from Mrs Obama’s speech as examples. I wrote them down and later included some of the phrasing in the draft that ultimately became the final speech. I did not check Mrs Obama’s speeches.”
At least there is an acknowledgement of a direct link between the two texts. Ms McIver said she tendered her resignation to Trump but he refused to accept it. “Mr Trump told me that people make innocent mistakes and that we learn and grow from these experiences.”
Philosophically she may be right but is such a basic mistake acceptable in a presidential campaign? Throughout both the convention and the White House race, Trump has struggled to prove his team can meet the demands of the campaign (as we argue in an FT editorial). The letter also highlights the overlap between Trump’s political and professional organisations — Ms McIver works for the Trump Organisation, not the Trump campaign. She is therefore not directly accountable to anyone in the Republican party.
Melania Trump accused of plagiarising Michelle Obama speech
Mr Trump aimed to show a side of him that had been less obvious during the bitter primaries
The person who wrote Melania Trump’s speech to the Republican convention should “probably” be fired, the Republican National Committee chairman said on Tuesday, after accusations that plagiarised parts of the address from Michelle Obama.
Reince Priebus said he did not blame Donald Trump’s wife for the controversy and that some of the themes of the speech were “pretty common”. But he seemed to concede that the issue had disrupted the convention.
“The distraction gets you off message a little bit this morning, but I think we’ll get back to action this afternoon,” he told a Bloomberg Politics event.
Mr Priebus’s suggestion that heads should roll was echoed by Corey Lewandowski, Mr Trump’s former campaign manager, who said his successor, Paul Manafort, should quit if he had approved the speech.
“Whoever . . . was the final sign-off that allowed this to go forward should be held accountable . . . I think if it’s Paul Manafort he’d do the right thing and resign,” Mr Lewandowski told CNN.
The Trump campaign denies that Mrs Trump took words from Mrs Obama’s speech to the 2008 Democratic convention, but several parts of the Slovenia-born former model’s speech were similar. Some phrases — including “you work hard for what you want in life, that your word is your bond and you do what you say” — were identical.
In response to the accusations of plagiarism, Jason Miller, the Trump campaign spokesman, said: “In writing her beautiful speech, Melania’s team of writers took notes on her life’s inspirations, and in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking. Melania’s immigrant experience and love for America shone through in her speech, which made it such a success.”
Chris Christie, the New Jersey governor and former prosecutor, told NBC’s Today he could not make the case for plagiarism — “not when 93 per cent of the speech is completely different than Michelle Obama’s speech.”
The controversy threatens to cast a cloud over the campaign plan to use Mr Trump’s wife and children to create a more palatable aura around him after he spent much of the past year employing divisive rhetoric.
Paul Manafort, his campaign manager, told the Financial Times on Sunday that the speeches by Mrs Trump and the Trump children would provide a more complete picture of the Republican candidate than has been painted by his rallies over the past year.
Earlier on Monday evening, Mr Trump received a string of endorsements from actors, soldiers and reality television stars who used primetime speeches to stress the need to “Make America Safe Again”, the latest variant of the “Make America Great Again” mantra around which Mr Trump has built his unorthodox populist campaign.
The biggest drama of the first day did not materialise on the huge event stage but on the floor of the convention, where some members of the Virginia delegation objected vociferously when convention leaders passed the rules without allowing delegates to vote. Last week, the Trump team defeated a last-ditch effort by the #NeverTrump movement to change the rules to remove his nomination.
A comparison of the key parts of the speeches
Melania Trump (July 2016): “My parents impressed on me the values that you work hard for what you want in life; that your word is your bond and you do what you say and keep your promise; that you treat people with respect.
Michelle Obama (August 2008): “And Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values: that you work hard for what you want in life; that your word is your bond and you do what you say you’re going to do; that you treat people with dignity and respect, even if you don’t know them, and even if you don’t agree with them.
MT: “They taught me to show the values and morals in my daily life. That is the lesson that I continue to pass along to our son.
MO: “And Barack Obama and I set out to build lives guided by these values, and pass them on to the next generations.
MT: “And we need to pass those lessons on to the many generations to follow, because we want our children in this nation to know that the only limit to your achievements is the strength of your dreams and your willingness to work for them.”
MO: “Because we want our children, and all children in this nation, to know that the only limit to the height of your achievement is the reach of your dreams and your willingness to work for them.”Source: Reuters
Daniel Rufty, a 29-year-old delegate from North Carolina, said he enjoyed the entertainment side of the Monday night event, but not the parts related to Mr Trump. “He’s teamed together with the establishment, they’re a bunch of cheats who are out of touch with the grass roots,” he said.
After campaigning on the need to “Make America Great Again”, Mr Trump’s first evening focused on the threat from radical Islamist terrorism, illegal immigration and the need to protect police after a spate of recent attacks on law enforcement officials.
David Clarke, an African-American sheriff from Milwaukee who has blamed the Black Lives Matter movement for inciting attacks on police, sparked applause when he told the crowd, “Blue Lives Matter!”
Jeff Sessions, the Alabama senator and one of Mr Trump’s biggest backers, homed in on his immigration policies. “For 30 years, our good people have rightly pleaded for an end to the lawlessness and for sound immigration policies that are fair and advance the national interest,” he said. “To this legitimate plea, our elites have responded with disdain, dismissal and scorn.”
©BloombergScott Baio, who played Chachi in 'Happy Days', was one of the 'showbiz' speakers
The night also saw the return of Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor, who sought to serve as a character witness. “I am sick and tired of the defamation of Donald Trump by the media and by the Clinton campaign. I am sick and tired of it. This is a good man.”
Mrs Trump for her part may not have been the final speaker but she essentially had the last word as many delegates left the convention hall after her speech ended.
“[My husband] has always been an amazing leader,” she concluded. “Now he will go to work for you.”
Elsewhere in Cleveland, senator Ted Cruz arrived and attempted to rally some support. But hours before he was scheduled to speak at the convention, Trump was trolling him from the skies. At a thank you party for supporters, Cruz had just finished telling people that out of a pool of 17 'talented, dynamic' Republican candidates, he had beaten 15 - just not 16 - rivals when something very funny happened. Take a look for yourself.
On the first couple of days, the convention defied expectations by being surprisingly peaceful; the mood on the streets was orderly and cheerful. But today, there was one sign of the underlying tension when a demonstrator decided to burn an American flag outside the gates of the convention centre.
The move immediately attracted a big crowd of reporters - and an even larger group of heavily armed security officials, who were funnelled together into a potentially dangerously small space, trapped in an alley just next to the centre. Some of the pro-Trump crowd started chanting "USA, USA!" as the demonstrators shouted "America was never great!" After a few minutes it seemed that the security officials had got the situation under control, and the demonstration started to disperse.
The incident illustrates the tensions that continue to bubble under the surface in Cleveland. The police, meanwhile, have a ubiquitous presence here but have clearly been told to operate with a low-key, non-confrontational approach, in sharp contrast to some earlier conventions.
Hope Hicks, Mr Trump's spokeswoman, was also taking a less confrontational approach than new Hampshire state senator Al Baldasaro, an adviser to the campaign on veterans' affairs, who called for Hillary Clinton to face a firing squad over her use of a private email server. "Mr. Trump and the campaign do not agree," Ms Hicks assured reporters.
No comments:
Post a Comment