Early Tuesday morning, some Trump campaign staffer had a full-fledged meltdown on MSNBC and threw a hissy fit about how Melania Trump’s plagiarized RNC speech was barely a one-day story. Not so much. Like so many scandals these days, the scandal absolutely could have been minimized into a one-day story if someone had simply stepped up in the first hours and said, “You know what, this was a bad move. We apologize, our bad.” It became a week-long story because the Trump campaign and other Republicans (Trump surrogates, mostly) couldn’t get their f—king stories straight. No one could come up with a plausible lie or, failing that, no one could properly sort out the blame for the plagiarism. I hope people are watching, because THIS is how Trump handles a minor crisis. Imagine how he would handle an actual crisis.

Anyway, we now know who was responsible for the plagiarized text in Melania’s RNC speech. The first reports came out in the NYT on Wednesday morning, and by Wednesday afternoon, the story was confirmed: THE BALLERINA DID IT. I’m not joking. At first, Melania’s RNC speech was written by two long-time Republican speechwriters, Matthew Scully and John McConnell. It seems that Melania didn’t like the speech they wrote, so she approached one of her husband’s ghostwriters, a former ballerina-turned-ghostwriter named Meredith McIver. McIver largely discarded the first draft and she worked with Melania to make a more tailored speech. McIver came forward with a personal written statement distributed by the Trump campaign:

My name is Meredith McIver and I’m an in-house staff writer at the Trump Organization. I am also a longtime friend and admirer of the Trump family.

In working with Melania on her recent first lady speech, we discussed many people who inspired her and messages she wanted to share with the American people. A person she has always liked is Michelle Obama. 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. 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.”

Yesterday, I offered my resignation to Mr. Trump and the Trump family but they rejected it. Mr. Trump told me that people make innocent mistakes and we learn and grow from these experiences.”

I asked to put out the statement because I did not like seeing the way this was distracting from Mr. Trump’s historic campaign for president and Melania’s beautiful message and presentation. I apologize for the confusion and hysteria my mistake has caused. Today, more than ever, I am honored to work for such a great family.”

[Via The NYT]

Once again, it sort of feels like the campaign is throwing Melania under the bus. The Trump Org. just distributed a statement saying that Melania was the one studying Michelle Obama’s speeches and telling her speechwriter which passages she wanted to copy! I can see how this is an honest mistake between Melania and Meredith, but there’s a larger problem: that no one in Trump’s campaign looked at Melania’s speech before she gave it, and no one thought to double-check it. Disorganized. Chaotic. Shambolic. Unprofessional. These are just some of the words that come to mind when thinking about this Republic National Convention.

Photos courtesy of WENN.