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Sen. Rand Paul is running of out of excuses. More instances of his plagiarism are being discovered everyday, so the Kentucky senator is now blaming the help.

In a statement today, Paul senior adviser Doug Stafford said, “In the thousands of speeches and op-eds Sen. Paul has produced, he has always presented his own ideas, opinions and conclusions. Sen. Paul also relies on a large number of staff and advisers to provide supporting facts and anecdotes — some of which were not clearly sourced or vetted properly. There have also been occasions where quotations or typesetting indentations have been left out through errors in our approval process, From here forward, quoting, footnoting and citing will be more complete…Adherence to a new approval process implemented by Sen. Paul will ensure proper citation and accountability in all collaborative works going forward.”

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After dismissing the people who have reported on his plagiarism as haters, and then saying that if it was legal he would challenge those reporting the facts to a duel, Paul is now trying to blame the help.

Paul’s plagiarism has been extensive. He has plagiarized speeches, books, newspaper op-eds, and even his own congressional testimony. Sen. Paul believed that he could make this scandal go away if he blamed partisan politics, but it continues to only get worse. Republicans believe that this will all blow over by the time Paul runs for president in 2016. However, the only way this happens is if Rand Paul stops plagiarizing. Every single speech or written word that Rand Paul is associated with going forward will be scrutinized.

Sen. Paul isn’t off the hook even if the staff is to blame, because he hired them. They are his staff. He is accountable for what they do. This is the sort of scandal that exposes Rand Paul as not ready for primetime. His mishandling of the scandal has made it exponentially worse. He took something that he could have dealt with by immediately apologizing, and turned it into a story that has grown for more than a week.

Blaming the help isn’t the way out of this for Paul. He needs to admit what he did, and apologize. A real leader doesn’t blame his subordinates for his own problems. Rand Paul drowning in his own scandal, and he is taking the entire Paul family political operation down with him.