Amateurs

Meredith McIver, a former ballerina turned Donald Trump co-author, is definitely a real person. But her social media persona, which came into being after she took the blame for Melania Trump’s plagiarized speech, definitely is not.

The account @imeredithmciver began tweeting on July 20, the day after Melania Trump’s prime-time Republican National Convention speech was upended by the revelation that she had cribbed some lines from an address by Michelle Obama at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. And it is still posing as McIver to this day, with no comment or pushback from the Trump campaign.

As the campaign is in the throes of daily sparring with a Gold Star family, fire marshals, and even the speaker of the House, there’s been no acknowledgment of the fake social media presence of McIver, who told The Daily Beast she has no online presence.

[...]

“I just wanted to set the record straight. @realDonaldTrump is a wonderful man,” the account tweeted just as McIver was getting roped into the burgeoning scandal. With her social media proclamation, the account included a photoshopped image of McIver and Trump standing next to each other in his office.

[...]

“This was my mistake,” McIver wrote in a July 20 letter with the Trump Organization logo embossed on the top. “Mr. Trump told me that people make innocent mistakes and that we learn and grow from these experiences.” She claimed that she offered her resignation and Trump simply would not accept.

And just like that McIver was gone. She didn’t make any more public statements. She didn’t appear as one of Trump’s surrogates on television as the convention wore on. No reporter seemed to be able to get a face-to-face interview with her.

[...]

McIver is a registered Democrat in New York who co-authored Trump’s 2004 book How to Get Rich and was specifically named in a 2007 deposition by Trump. (He blamed her for overstating his debt so as to make his financial comeback look even more impressive.)

She is still alive too, it would seem. She responded to a request for comment from The Daily Beast.

“I have never had a Twitter or Facebook account,” McIver wrote in an email.

  Daily Beast

The Trump campaign will have to "fix" this. What will they do?

Yet on Monday night, @imeredithmciver claimed that McIver would be making an appearance on Jake Tapper’s show The Lead on Friday. When shown the tweet and asked whether the appearance would be happening, Tapper just said “nope” in a direct message.

Twitter was awash in jokes about this from the first moment the mea culpa appeared. Didn't the Trump campaign realize this would happen? Or, maybe they just don't care. The system is rigged! 

Oh, wait...

The McIver account itself did not respond to direct messages requesting more information, but someone claiming to run it sent an extensive email to The Daily Beast claiming that the RNC hired them.

Well, that explains it. But surely the Trump campaign was consulted. They would have at least known about the ruse.  Or would they?

For now, McIver’s impersonators are acting with impunity and tricking supporters and reporters alike. Whether the Twitter account is actually an invention of the Trump staffers or just an elaborate troll, the campaign that allowed its candidate to retweet images from white supremacists is again indicating that social media is not its strongest suit.

But neither is it for his supporters.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.