Melania Trump speech: Republican Convention plagiarism controversy blamed on Clinton by Trump campaign

Donald Trump’s campaign chairman Paul Manafort has blamed the furore over an apparently plagiarised section of Melania Trump’s convention speech on her husband’s Democratic presidential rival, calling it “another example of when Hillary Clinton is threatened by a female, the first thing she does is try to destroy that person”.

What appeared on Monday evening to be an effective performance from Mr Trump’s third wife turned into a PR disaster overnight, as it emerged that at least two paragraphs of her primetime speech to the Republican convention in Cleveland bore stark similarities to Michelle Obama’s address to the Democratic convention in 2008.

Mr Manafort insisted Ms Trump’s was “a great speech”, recalling its focus on her love for her husband and their family. “Obviously Michelle Obama feels very similar sentiments towards her family,” he said, adding: “We don’t believe there’s anything in that speech that doesn’t reflect [Ms Trump’s] thinking.”

Faulting the media for focusing on the two suspect paragraphs in a speech of more than 1,400 words, Mr Manafort suggested it was the Clinton campaign that had stoked the controversy. Buzzfeed reported that the 2008 speech was written by Sarah Hurwitz, a former speechwriter for Ms Clinton who now works as a special assistant to President Obama.

It is thought the first person to note the similarities between the two speeches was journalist Jarrett Hill.

Ms Trump, 46, had approached her husband’s campaign asking to speak at the convention, Mr Manafort claimed on Tuesday, telling them she wanted “the people of the United States to see the man I love”. Without explicitly denying or admitting that the section in question had been borrowed from Ms Obama, Mr Manafort insisted Ms Trump’s words were “personal to her”, adding: “Words like care and compassion… Those are not extraordinary words. They are normal words.”

Mr Trump tweeted on Monday night that his wife’s “speech and demeanour were absolutely incredible”.

In an interview with NBC before delivering her speech, Ms Trump said she had written it herself “with as little help as possible”. According to Mr Trump’s senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, the Slovenian former model had a “team of writers” who “took notes on her life’s inspirations, and in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking”.

Ms Trump is known to be a reluctant political spouse, who has rarely surfaced on the campaign trail in recent months. That her most high-profile appearance to date should leave her mired in controversy will surely do little to encourage her to return to the stump. “This is what we were so afraid of,” Republican consultant Nicole Wallace told broadcaster MSNBC, even suggesting that the Trumps’ “marriage is on the line” over the incident.

Mr Manafort’s predecessor Corey Lewandowski, who was fired from the campaign in June, suggested the person at fault ought to be fired, saying on Tuesday: “If the staff did not do their job properly… there should be accountability.”

Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus appeared to agree with that sentiment, saying he would punish the writer responsible. “Certainly I don’t blame [Ms Trump] for anything,” he told Bloomberg.

In her speech, Ms Trump said: “From a young age, 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. They taught and showed me values and morals in their daily life.

“That is a message that I continue to pass along to our son. 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.”

The excerpt closely resembled a portion of Ms Obama’s 2008 DNC address, in which the future First Lady said: “Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values: like, you work hard for what you want in life; that your word is your bond; that 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.

“And Barack and I set out to build lives guided by these values and to pass them onto the next generation, because we want our children – and all children in this nation – to know that the only limit to the height of your achievements is the reach of your dreams and your willingness to work hard for them.”

Commentators agreed that such a blatant oversight was unfathomable, even coming from the famously disorganised Trump campaign. Mr Obama’s former chief speechwriter Jon Favreau told Buzzfeed he had “no idea” how the mistake might have occurred. “A stray line or phrase could be a mistake. Two full paragraphs from the current First Lady is just incomprehensible,” Mr Favreau said. “I can’t believe someone would do that to her.”