Melania's Speech Looks to Have Plagiarized One by Michelle Obama

In what could turn into a PR disaster for the Republican National Convention, parts of Melania Trump's Monday night speech appear to have been lifted from the speech Michelle Obama delivered on the first night of the Democratic National Convention in 2008. Journalist Jarrett Hill was the first to pick up on the similarities, as below:

• Near the beginning of her speech, Melania 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."
• In Michelle Obama's 2008 speech in Denver, she said: "And 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."

• Two sentences later, Melania said: "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."
• Michelle, 2008: "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."

CNN notes that earlier on Monday, Melania told NBC that she wrote the speech with as "little help as possible." Early Tuesday, a Trump campaign spokesman did not directly address the accusation of plagiarism, but 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," the Guardian reports. (More Republican National Convention stories.)