A speechwriter for Melania Trump took the blame Wednesday for lifting passages from a 2008 Michelle Obama speech, admitting she made a “mistake” – while saying she offered her resignation, but it was rejected.
In a written apology put out by the Donald Trump campaign responding to the furor, a self-described “in house staff writer” at the Trump Organization named Meredith McIver said she worked with Melania Trump on her opening-night convention speech.
She said that she wrote down passages from the first lady's speech during planning discussions, after Melania Trump mentioned them as the kind of message she wanted to share.
“I wrote them down and later included some of the phrasing in the draft that ultimately became the final speech,” she said. “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.”
The statement comes after Trump campaign officials repeatedly denied plagiarism charges a day earlier, and downplayed the controversy over the strikingly similar passages.
The similarities were noticed shortly after Melania's otherwise well-received speech, and the controversy dogged the Trump campaign for much of the convention's second day. Even ex-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski urged his replacement, Paul Manafort, to find out who was responsible.