Problematic prose: Senate candidate Sheehy’s book appears to contain four plagiarized portions

When Montanans see an advertisement or hear U.S. Senate candidate and political newcomer Tim Sheehy speak, he’ll likely talk about his experiences as a businessman and pilot who launched an aerial firefighting company in Bozeman. It’s a central part of the campaign and the candidate’s identity.

The Republican who is challenging incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester has built that backstory: First he was a U.S. Navy SEAL, combat wounded, and then a businessman who even wrote a book on aerial firefighting. That book was widely seen as a prelude or introduction of Sheehy as a public figure.

The book, “Mudslingers: A True Story of Aerial Firefighting,” was also subtitled, “An American Origins Story.” It’s part history, part travelogue and part autobiography, published in 2023 by Permuted Press and distributed by publishing giant Simon and Schuster.

But, the book which has helped solidify his place as a candidate and authority on aerial firefighting seems to have at least four different passages that were plagiarized — sourced, but not credited in the book, according to an investigation by the Daily Montanan.

The Daily Montanan put Sheehy’s book through commercially available software that scans texts against a massive store of other published and online sources to compare passages. The software is commonly used by publishers, academic institutions and researchers to check for originality, possible copyright or intellectual property violations, or to find the origins of a particular fact or statement.

The Daily Montanan reached out to the Sheehy campaign for further explanation, but heard nothing back from it.

The Daily Montanan also reached out to Permuted Press, the book’s publisher, with a list of questions including some pertaining to the vetting, writing and editing process, but it did not respond either.

Though Permuted Press published the work, according to the book’s introductory pages, Sheehy holds the copyright.

It is not the first time the details of Sheehy’s life before politics have come under scrutiny for their truthfulness. Sheehy’s past, including a gunshot wound that may have been sustained in Glacier National Park, claims of parachute training over Glacier, and his business dealings including his aerial firefighting company, Bridger Aerospace, have come under fire. It’s also not the first time that Sheehy has remained silent when confronted with difficult questions. Sheehy has not openly commented or explained a recording of him in which he repeated on different occasions disparaging comments about Native Americans drinking, even after being called upon by Montana’s tribal leaders to disavow, apologize or explain the comments.

Even the book itself has come under scrutiny: It promises that all of the proceeds from telling the story of aerial firefighters will go back to supporting them. However, as other media outlets have reported, including Business Insider, it appears that the proceeds of the book go back to an aerial firefighting lobbying company which Sheehy himself founded, which in turn, works on behalf of his own company, raising questions about whether the money is really being funneled right back to him.

Problems inside the book

According to Sheehy’s own writing, he penned “Mudslingers” in his spare time and then had it published. He described it in the prologue as a way to collect and tell the story of American aerial firefighting, combining the history and practice of aerial firefighting with his own experience as an aerial firefighter.

The book runs 309-pages long and does include a bibliography and source list. One of the four problematic passages discovered by the Daily Montanan was included generally in the list; the other three were not.

One of the things that is different about “Mudslingers” is that it contains no footnotes, no endnotes and no citations, making it difficult to tell how sources listed in the back of the book are worked into the books’ pages. Another challenge is that the book is part autobiography, part history, blurring the lines of Sheehy’s life with those of the others he’s profiling.

For example, the first direct quotation of any length is found on Page 25, and is made by John Gould, a chief executive of an air tanker company that flies DC-10s. However, it is unclear by the citation or the source list whether the interview was conducted by Sheehy himself as a researcher, or taken from some other work. The same thing happens about 10 pages later at the next quotation with a man named Jason Robinson.

But, those are not the passages of greater concern that raise questions of plagiarism.

Plagiarism usually occurs when a source takes another’s work and presents it as his own without attribution or citation. Correct attribution and citation usually involves endnotes, footnotes, or quotations that let readers know where the material is coming from, and crediting the original authors for their first-hand work.

The Daily Montanan found four instances where Sheehy’s work is nearly verbatim, if not identical, to an older known source, but is presented as his original work. The Daily Montanan also checked that there was not quotation marks or other annotation that would suggest Sheehy was trying to communicate to readers sourced material.

The first questionable passage in “Mudslingers,” occurs on Page 33 where Sheehy apparently needs a definition of smokejumper and inserts a definition found on Wikipedia. It is the shortest in length of the four examples found by the Daily Montanan.

Comparing the passages, Sheehy uses the same 26 words in the same order as the Wikipedia definition, with only one exception, to add the word “often” in the middle of it. The definition is not used with quotation marks or citation. Wikipedia is not cited as a source or in the bibliography.

The second problematic passage appears to be taken from “Wildfire Today,” which is a website showcasing news about wildland fire.

In that portion of the book, Sheehy describes a lawsuit that centers on the environmental impacts of dropping fire-fighting foam and the possible health effects of the chemicals. Four paragraphs, or a large chunk of Page 208 in the book, contains large portions of three entire paragraphs from the website that are nearly identical, including three paragraphs of continuous text that don’t appear with citation or attribution. It also appears that Sheehy, who is listed as the sole author of the book, may have added a date or inserted a clause to help orient the reader.

For example, at the beginning of the passage from “Wildfire Today,” the website doesn’t list a date for the lawsuit centering on the firefighting foam. But in the text of Sheehy’s book, he adds, “In the fall of 2022.” Later on in the paragraph, he deleted the verb “has” in an apparent move to coordinate the verb tense for his book. Otherwise, the next 59 words are identical, in identical order. Large blocks of the next three paragraphs show similar results.

The next portion the Daily Montanan examined came from “The Backseat Pilot,” an aviation website that offers resources and education to pilots. Four paragraphs are nearly identical, in identical order. It appears that Sheehy only edited a portion of it at the end to condense some of the technical information he was presenting about how the thrust of propeller-driven engines worked.

“The Backseat Pilot” is the only one of the four passages in “Mudslingers” that is listed in the sources, but within in the text, it is not cited or presented as a quotation.

The possibly plagiarized passage contained on Page 237, is four paragraphs and consists of six sentences. The first 75 words are an exact match — same words, same order — as the “Backseat Pilot,” and even after that, it appears that Sheehy may have taken parts of the next two sentences.

The final passage the Daily Montanan looked at was a portion of a paragraph that describes a support operation for the Afghan Air Force, found on Page 289, and seemingly taken from a 2022 article from the San Marino Tribune.

Based on this passage, which doesn’t appear with citation, quotation or in the bibliography, “Mudslingers” uses the one-sentence paragraph and changes the position of the verb and inserts a pronoun, but otherwise 31 out of 40 words match. In this particular case, Sheehy appears to have changed the order of the words at the beginning of the sentence which were almost identical to the original, just in a slightly different order.

Problems outside the book

Even before Sheehy’s book was published in December 2023, it had already drawn scrutiny. An Aug. 10, 2023, story by Bryan Metzger of “Business Insider” summarized the challenge in the headline of his story: “GOP Senate candidate plans to steer book sale money to a group that lobbies for his industry, teeing up potential conflict of interest.”

It details that Sheehy set up a lobbying and industry group in Washington,D.C., United Aerial Firefighters, where the proceeds of the book sales have gone. The Daily Montanan has asked about those proceeds, but has not received a response from the publisher. The lobbyist for the UAF is the same one used by Sheehy’s company, according to the Business Insider article.

The Business Insider article summarizes just a few of the conflicts-of-interest that Sheehy’s campaign has had to face, including self-dealing: “If Sheehy’s campaign chooses to promote the book when it’s released, that would mean using campaign resources to raise money for a lobbying organization that benefits Sheehy’s bottom line.”

The problems with plagiarism

Paul Pope, associate professor of political science at Montana State University-Billings, seems perfectly positioned for a case just like this. Pope is an expert in political science, and especially the use of words and narratives in political campaigns. Some of his training and work involves forensic analysis of candidates’ words and speeches. He teaches full-time so is also familiar with the academic implications of plagiarism, as well as being immersed in the field of politics in Montana.

Previously, Pope has published on the role of narratives and how they changed throughout the reporting and re-telling of the Jan. 6 insurrection.

He said that with most any information being as easy as a click away on the internet, plus the ease of technology which allows students to copy and paste something into a document, plagiarism, citation, and attribution have become even more essential in classrooms and in the world to help clearly define the boundaries of one’s own work.

“It’s ridiculously easy. Technology has made plagiarism so possible,” Pope said.

He said that in his classes, any sentence that is more than 50% sourced from someone else needs citation, “almost universally,” noting that his approach is one that is commonly shared by other professors and academic institutions, not just the political science department at MSU-B.

“If he did what he’s accused of doing here at a university, he’d fail,” Pope said, referring to Sheehy.

He said the academic penalties at colleges and universities can vary, but the penalties for even plagiarizing a paper could lead to getting a zero on the paper, failing the course or even being kicked out of the college. He said as more and more work is scrutinized for plagiarism, some universities and colleges are even rescinding degrees based on plagiarism.

It’s not the first time even recently that a U.S. Senate candidate in Montana has been embroiled in a plagiarism scandal. Former U.S. Sen. John Walsh, a Democrat, appointed by former Gov. Steve Bullock, who served the remainder of former Sen. Max Baucus’ term after Baucus was appointed as U.S. Ambassador to China, had to drop a re-election bid after opposition research by Republicans revealed that Walsh had plagiarized parts of his master’s thesis at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, while serving in the military. The War College later rescinded Walsh’s advanced degree.

Pope said most universities and colleges have seen an uptick in the cases of plagiarism because the software detection has become so sophisticated. But, those same institutions, including most in Montana, have adopted academic integrity training and policies, which focus on how to avoid plagiarism as part of their code of conduct or ethics, meaning that students can be dismissed. Moreover, he said even recently at MSU-B, the academic offices have begun to coordinate information to help alert professors and instructors of students who have been found to plagiarize.

“It’s the high performing students who tend to do it,” he said, which can be counterintuitive. “It’s usually someone who is stretched too thing and they’re overloaded.”

Pope also said that there’s different things to look for in plagiarism cases. For example, sometimes, it may be clear that the student or the author just forgot or was careless. Other times, when the word order is slightly changed or verb tenses are altered to fit more smoothly into a paper or presentation, then it’s often a sign of intentional manipulation.

In Sheehy’s “Mudslingers” case, it seems clear to Pope.

“One section? Maybe,” Pope said. “Four? That’s a pattern.”

He said that regardless of the number of words, paragraphs or passages, the reason for students as well as professionals is often the same.

“They think they’ll get away with it,” Pope said. “But plagiarism is lying. It’s just an untrustworthy behavior. And, we generally don’t trust liars.”

However, what the plagiarism might mean to Sheehy’s chances at a seat in the United States Senate, remains something harder to predict.

The most recent polling data shows that Sheehy, the Republican, has taken a larger lead over the incumbent Democrat Tester. One poll had Tester outside the margin-of-error, showing him trailing by 6 percentage points. The Cook Political report recently shifted the race from a toss-up to “leans Republican.”

However, the most recent polling data also was conducted before a torrent of decidedly unfavorable news about Sheehy, including two recordings which were first reported by the Char-Koosta News about him describing Crow Native Americans as “drunk,” something which Montana’s tribal communities have excoriated, and demanded an apology for. So far, Sheehy has remained silent on the issue.

Pope said that because of the deeply divided nature and extreme partisanship that has been present in politics during this cycle, more negative news about Sheehy may not be game-changer, even though it may have been a death sentence to other candidates not so long ago.

Pope said it’s counterintuitive, but the more divided and acrimonious the political climate, the more each side will tend to ignore unfavorable or unflattering news about their favored candidate.

Tribalism, a commonly used phrase in politics, may be at play here, Pope said. That is often summarized as “everyone on the other side is a traitor.”

He also said that Sheehy has something else in his favor: Recent polling shows that among Sheehy’s strongest bloc of support are those who have lesser education, and may not have a college degree. Pope said that because of the demographics, that bloc doesn’t tend to read as many books, so it may discount plagiarism as an academic technicality, or not care about Sheehy’s skill as an author.

However, Pope also said news of plagiarism could still wind up hurting Sheehy because it fits with a narrative that has been developed by news reporting, including of not telling the truth about a gun incident in Glacier Park, or another training which Sheehy talked about but has later been debunked.

“Plagiarism is no different than lying to the public. It’s the same thing,” Pope said. “It’s a pattern of dishonesty.”

He also said that the Sheehy campaign’s apparent strategy of remaining quiet in the face of some of the controversies, including questions about plagiarism, is also part of a political calculus.

“Don’t give it any attention or any oxygen,” Pope said. “The less they talk about it, the less attention it draws. They’re hoping people forget about it because once he starts speaking, he’s on the defensive. It requires great political discipline. Not too many politicians can do it. They get roped into it.”

The unknown variable, Pope said, is always timing.

“It could be a blip,” he said, “Or it could destroy him.”

This story was originally published by the Daily Montanan