The words lifted from Michelle Obama's 2008 speech that were included in Melania Trump's speech at Monday night's Republican National Convention were an inside job intended to hurt GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, says Democratic operative James Carville.
"I think they were done in," Carville said Tuesday on the "The Mike Lupica Podcast."
Carville said it is only a theory, but he has run it by five or six people experienced in national politics, and "no one says this is nuts."
The comments start around the 48:30 mark in the audio above.
Carville noted that many Republicans have told him they feel the only way to save their party in light of Trump's nomination is for Trump to "lose big" in November.
With a virtual "sweatshop" of speechwriters churning out speeches for conventions, one was likely to be a Republican who doesn't like Trump, Carville said. The paraphrased words of Michelle Obama's 2008 Democratic National Committee speech were put into the Melania Trump speech, then, once the speech was delivered, that person contacted the press and alerted them, according to the theory.
No one in the Trump campaign caught the error because the campaign is too disorganized, he said.
Carville admitted his is a "20 percent theory," but added, "My guess is that they were intentionally done in with this."
Carville is a longtime associate of Bill and Hillary Clinton. Paul Manafort, Trump's campaign manager, earlier Tuesday said the whole dustup was over nothing and was planted by the Hillary Clinton campaign.