A new report by the New York Times’ Jonathan Martin finds that Senator John Walsh (D., Mont.) apparently plagiarized large parts of his thesis in 2007 while obtaining his master’s degree from the United States Army War College.
Walsh, who was 46 at the time, failed to cite and used the exact language from various sources, including documents from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, among others. The Times reports that parts of Walsh’s thesis were taken “word-for-word” without citations or footnotes; the article estimates about one-third of the thesis fails to cite sources, while another third provides footnotes, but uses the “authors’ exact — or almost exact — language without quotation marks.”
Walsh, an Iraq War veteran, said he did not plagiarize the works, although a campaign aide later said that Walsh was working on his thesis during a difficult personal time following the suicide of one of his unit members.
Walsh, who was appointed to replace Senator Max Baucus in February after Baucus was named United States ambassador to China, is facing election in November. Polls show Walsh trailing his Republican challenger Representative Steve Daines by a relatively wide margin.