The campaign for Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis (D) hit back at her opponent Greg Abbott and conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh for attacking her personal life earlier this week.
In an email to supporters titled "They're getting desperate," Davis' campaign manager Karin Johanson said the Texas state senator's opponents would "try anything, including the typical dirty tricks we're all tired of" to bring Davis down.
"I guess Rush Limbaugh just couldn't help himself," Johanson wrote.
Johnason criticized Limbaugh for having "one of his infamous outbursts," referencing a recent show where he called Davis a "fraud."
HuffPost's Laura Bassett reported earlier on the controversy surrounding Davis' personal life:
In response to a Dallas Morning News article on Sunday that called into question a few specific details of Davis' personal life -- including when she became a single mother, how long she lived in a trailer with her daughter and who paid for her law school degree -- conservative pundits were quick to call Davis a liar.
"So Abortion Barbie had a Sugar Daddy Ken," tweeted Fox News pundit Erick Erickson, referring to Davis' famous filibuster of an anti-abortion bill in the Texas state Senate last year and to her second husband. "[Not] exactly the bio she claimed."
Radio host Rush Limbaugh called Davis "fake" and a "genuine head case," while the campaign of Davis' Republican opponent, Texas state Attorney General Greg Abbott, warned voters not to "indulge her fanciful narrative."
The discrepancies pointed out by The Dallas Morning News in Davis' tale of past hardships were relatively minor. Davis has said she was a divorced single mother at 19, when she was only separated at 19. Her divorce did not become final until she was 21. She has told stories about the difficulty of living in a trailer with her daughter, but the article noted they lived in that mobile home for just a few months. Davis mentioned in 2012 that her mother had a sixth-grade education; in fact, her mother has a ninth-grade education.
In the email to supporters, Johanson wrote that Davis "has a true Texas story."
"Her path wasn’t easy, but she never gave in. She worked hard to build a better life for herself and her family -- despite the challenges, Wendy persevered," Johanson wrote, warning the "attacks are just going to keep coming."