HELENA, Mont. (AP) – Montana Sen. John Walsh’s thesis written to earn a master’s degree from the U.S. Army War College contains unattributed passages taken word-for-word from previously published papers.
The Democrat is running against Republican Rep. Steve Daines to keep the seat Walsh was appointed to in February when Max Baucus resigned to become U.S. ambassador to China.
The New York Times first reported the apparent plagiarism in Walsh’s 2007 thesis, titled “The Case for Democracy as a Long Term National Strategy.” Walsh submitted the paper in pursuit of a Master of Strategic Studies degree nearly two years after he returned from Iraq and about a year before he became Montana’s adjutant general overseeing the state’s National Guard and Department of Military Affairs.
Walsh’s campaign said the senator did not intend to plagiarize and that he would speak to The Associated Press later Wednesday.
“This was unintentional and it was a mistake. There were areas that should have been cited differently but it was completely unintentional,” spokeswoman Lauren Passalacqua said in a statement. “Senator Walsh released every single evaluation that he received during his 33-year military career, which shows an honorable and stellar record of service to protecting Montana and serving this country in Iraq.”