On February 16 2007, Barack Obama gave a speech in Wisconsin where he answered allegations from his main political rival, Hillary Clinton, that all he had to offer was “just words”.

To answer the charge, he quoted a series of well-known speeches and documents from U.S. history, including those by Martin Luther King Jr, John F. Kennedy as well as the Declaration of Independence and asked if they were “Just Words”,

It appeared, in a YouTube 'side-by-side' video that Obama was using parts of Governor Deval Patrick's speech from a speech Patrick made a year prior.

The Clinton campaign seized on this and accused Obama of plagiarism.

Obama and Patrick responded saying that Patrick had asked Obama to use those words of his in making the point.

While this has been the only instance of Obama's record of plagiarism reported in mainstream media, there have been many other occasions where Obama directly took words from other politicians such as Senator John Edwards announcement speech from his presidential bid in 2004.

Barack Obama plagiarized this speech on February 10, 2007 during his presidential announcement.

^[0]

Vice president Joe Biden also has a notorious record of plagiarism throughout his academic ^[6]and political ^[8]career which reflects greatly on Barack Obama's cabinet.

^[5]