Donald Trump Criticized Joe Biden for Plagiarism Last Year

Donald Trump last year targeted Vice President Joe Biden for his history of plagiarism, arguing that Biden’s past mistakes would give Trump an advantage if Biden entered the race.

It’s now Trump who finds himself on the receiving end of similar accusations, after Melania Trump’s speech at the Republican National Convention included a passage that appeared to borrow heavily from Michelle Obama’s convention address in 2008.

Biden dropped out of the presidential race in 1987, acknowledging he “made some mistakes” that cast an “exaggerated shadow” over his campaign, the New York Times reported at the time. Biden had been accused of plagiarism as a law school student and as a politician, when he echoed—without attribution—the words of British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock.

In an interview with radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt in August 2015, Trump named his lack of involvement in plagiarism as one of the advantages he would have over Biden, who was at that time still weighing a presidential run.

“If it’s Joe Biden, how do you match up against Joe Biden?” Hewitt asked Trump in the interview.

“I think I’d match up great,” Trump said. “I’m a job producer. I’ve had a great record. I haven’t been involved in plagiarism. I think I would match up very well against Biden.”