Mikie Sherrill can’t keep her story straight.
The New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial nominee keeps changing her account of her involvement in an infamous 1990s US Naval Academy cheating scandal — and alumni don’t believe her latest explanation.
“I don’t buy it, and I’m kind of speaking on behalf of actually a lot of classmates that reached out to me,” Brent Sadler, who graduated from the Academy in 1994, the same class as Sherrill, and serves as a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told The Post.
Sherrill, last month, confirmed she didn’t walk during her class’ commencement and claimed she was penalized because she “didn’t turn in some of my classmates.”
“There was a test at the school that was stolen. I did not realize that it was stolen. I took the test, afterwards, I knew what the rumor mill was. I knew people who were implicated in it. I didn’t come forward with that information,” the congresswoman explained at an event last month.
But then last week, following her debate against Republican Jack Ciattarelli, Sherrill appeared to suggest that she did, in fact, come forward with that information.
“There were hundreds of people in my class that spoke to investigators. When I did, I told them what I knew,” she told reporters after her second debate when asked about her explanation.
Her campaign declined to answer questions from The Post on whether that means Sherrill eventually did rat out her classmates.
The New Jersey Globe, which broke the story about her being barred from walking, reported that there had been rumors during her 2018 congressional race that she was caught up in the cheating scandal, and it had been “suggested” to the outlet “at the time that Sherrill was not involved.”
Sherrill has refused to release her full record, which would paint a fuller picture of what happened.
A source who was involved in the Naval Academy’s investigation into the cheating scandal also expressed skepticism about Sherrill’s version of events, saying, “There would have to be more” to the story based on the punishment she received.
Sadler, who penned an op-ed about his concerns over Sherrill’s Naval Academy record earlier this month, argued that Sherrill looks like she’s “trying to obscure and to evade.”
He also has questions about whether Sherrill received additional discipline from the elite school.
The academy’s creed, known as the “honor concept,” stipulates that midshipmen “do not lie,” “do not cheat,” and “do not steal.” Sadler contended that midshipmen are obligated to bring attention to violations of the honor concept, “otherwise you are just as guilty as the party involved.”
He believes that her public admission about not coming forward with information she knew about the cheating scandal sounds like a violation of the honor concept.
Besides expulsion, the way to rectify that is a corrective program known as honor remediation, which includes tasks such as writing papers reflecting on their transgressions.
“Some of the things they had to do that I remember is that they had to write a letter … to the [academy] superintendent [saying ‘I am] very sorry …. I’ve learned my lesson,’” the investigative source recounted of how remediation worked. “Which is really horses—.”
Sherrill has a 254-day gap after graduation, during which she remained at Annapolis.
Sherrill’s campaign told The Post that she was waiting for a slot to open up in flight school during that period.
But that explanation is also drawing scrutiny.
“It doesn’t make any sense to me,” Sadler said when asked about how Sherrill could’ve been barred from walking and not faced further discipline.
“There was only one group of folks associated with the double E scandal that didn’t graduate … but then got the commission later, and their degree later … and that was for this remediation, this honor code remediation.”
Sherrill’s campaign denies that claim, saying she was merely on temporary duty after she graduated.
The cheating scandal, which drew national attention in the 1990s, revolved around a Dec. 14, 1992, exam for Electrical Engineering 311, which is a notoriously difficult mandatory class for all non-engineering majors.
Of the 663 students who took the exam, 88 were found guilty, the Washington Post reported at the time. Of the guilty, about two dozen were expelled, and at least 64 received lesser penalties such as late graduation.
“We had a pretty extensive [knowledge] of who had the exam based on their answer keys,” added the investigative source, who stressed that the main challenge of the probe lay in getting students to admit to cheating.
When asked point-blank if Sherrill went through honor remediation and several other questions for this story, her campaign tore into Ciattarelli.
“Jack Ciattarelli is desperately attempting to smear Mikie Sherrill,” communications director Sean Higgins said, “because he’s embroiled in a scandal after making millions from publishing misinformation about opioids and even developing an app to coach patients to get Hydrocodone.”
Ciattarelli’s campaign announced plans last week to sue Sherrill over her jarring accusations in last week’s debate that he “killed tens of thousands of people” through his publishing company’s content, which included material downplaying the risks of opioids.
