Melania suspected someone in 'Trump World' added Michelle Obama's lines to her 2016 speech on purpose: Book
When news broke that Melania Trump's 2016 Republican National Convention speech was plagiarized from former first lady Michelle Obama's 2008 DNC speech, the then-future first lady was not embarrassed, revealed her former friend and adviser Stephanie Winston Wolkoff in her explosive new tell-all book, 'Melania And Me.'
In the bombshell book that hit the stands on Tuesday, September 1, Wolkoff said that she had offered to refer the mother-of-one to someone who could help her with the speech but Melania was not interested in taking the offer. After delivering the speech, when reports emerged that large portions of the speech had been lifted straight out of her predecessor's old speech, Wolkoff said that her ex-friend was not embarrassed. Instead, she was suspicious as to who had conspired against her.
"She was suspicious that the plagiarism had been left in on purpose. Someone in Trump World didn't want Melania to shine. We talked about who that might be. Who stood to gain by making Melania look bad? Our conversations were guarded, and she kept it light, as always. But it seemed to her, and to me, that the plagiarized speech was like drawing first blood between rivals. Or was it a warning that Melania should stay in the background?'' Wolkoff wrote in the book.
One of the paragraphs of Michelle's old speech read, "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."
And Melania's weirdly similar section read: "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."
President Donald Trump's then-senior communications adviser Jason Miller had issued a statement prior to Melania's speech that their team of writers "took notes on her life's inspirations, and in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking." Meredith McIver, a staff writer for the Trump Organization took the blame for the fiasco, saying she inadvertently copied part of Michelle's speech. She also offered to resign over the scandal but apparently the president refused to let her resign.
Wolkoff has recently been making headlines almost every day as multiple outlets lined up interviews with her before her book release. On Tuesday, September 1, she spilled in an interview with the Washinton Post that the first lady 'regularly' used a private Trump Organization email account, which could be accessed from a MelaniaTrump.com domain, iMessage and an encrypted messaging app while in the White House. She said Melania and she corresponded multiple times a day. “Melania and I both didn’t use White House emails,” she said.
The publication said it "viewed messages dated after the inauguration that appear to be from private email and messaging accounts used by Melania Trump" which included "finances for the presidential inauguration, key parts of which Winston Wolkoff, an experienced New York City events producer, planned." Other topics that were discussed were government hires and contracts, schedules for Melania and President Donald Trump, plans for an overseas trip, the first lady’s Be Best initiative and the Easter egg roll.
As soon as news of Melania using her private email account for official business hit the news circuit, reactions started pouring in on social media as people likened the current scenario to the FBI launching an investigation into the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, which became Trump's campaign focus at the time. He also continued to raise the issue during his re-election campaign with his supporters often chanting 'Lock Her Up' at the rallies.