Earlier in the week, CNN’s Brianna Keilar and Trump campaign official Mercedes Schlapp clashed over mail-in voting, with Keilar losing patience with Schlapp’s lies and barking, “You’re just saying a bunch of crap!”

In an op-ed published on RealClearPolitics, Schlapp punched back at Keilar, but in an unusual broadside, Schlapp also made a personal attack on Keilar’s husband, an active duty Green Beret. “I was further disturbed to learn that Brianna Keilar’s husband is a ferocious opponent of the president, a former director of the National Security Council under President Obama, and a man who tweets, among other things, that Donald Trump makes him ‘throw up,'” she wrote.

However, this attack was baseless — Keilar’s husband never tweeted any such thing.

In addition to a fierce response from Keilar, CNN anchor Jake Tapper weighed in, saying “to smear with lies Brianna’s husband, an active duty Green Beret, as part of her political vendetta is truly despicable. Truly vile.”

In response to ⁦⁦@mercedesschlapp⁩’s ⁦@RealClearNews⁩ op-ed. Get your facts straight. And don’t mess with my family. pic.twitter.com/pMgIyfSEv0

— Brianna Keilar (@brikeilarcnn) August 6, 2020

.@mercedesschlapp is entitled to her opinion about @brikeilarcnn or me or anyone else in the news media.

But to smear with lies Brianna’s husband, an active duty Green Beret, as part of her political vendetta is truly despicable. Truly vile. https://t.co/rtSnR6QZpV

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) August 6, 2020

After smearing @brikeilarcnn’s husband — an active duty Green Beret — with a paragraph of unadulterated lies, @mercedesschlapp, @RealClearNews, and the Trump campaign removed the paragraph and posted the below, with no apology/transparency, hoping no one will notice. Disgraceful. https://t.co/MnS72Sre5l

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) August 7, 2020

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