Baerbock's Campaign Under Threat After Plagarism Accusations

Focus Online is carrying a story stating that chancellor candidate for the environmentalist Greens, Annalena Baerbock, is facing allegations of plagarising sections of her recently-released book, 'Jetzt. Wie wir unser Land erneuern' ('Now. How We Renew Our Land').

• So far the Austrian 'media scientist' Stefan Weber has released three excerpts containing alleged plagarised material in the book - co-authored with Michael Ebmeyer - and stated that he has discovered six more in the same book.
• Earlier in the election campaign, in May, Baerbock's spokesman tweeted pictures of the copy of her degree certificate from the LSE after allegations had arisen from right-wing blogs that she had inflated her qualifications. This, alongside plagarism, is an offence that can end the career of a German politician - in May Families Minister Franziska Giffey was forced to resign after it emerged she had plagarised sections of her PhD thesis.
• Should the allegations of plagarism be proved it could prove damaging to Baerbock's campaign, which is already suffering through a period of poor opinion polling numbers.
• After three months of consistently leading opinion polls identifying respondents' 'preferred chancellor', Baerbock has not led in the contest since 7 June, falling well behind centre-right CDU candidate Armin Laschet and in some into third place behind SPD chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz.