WASHINGTON — Rep. Beto O'Rourke is crying foul over another attack ad from Sen. Ted Cruz — this one asserting that the El Paso Democrat "wants to decriminalize unauthorized border crossings."

The news stories on which the Cruz camp based the claim do not, in fact, cite O'Rourke calling for an end to the federal crime of illegal entry. Rather, he has called for ending the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy of pressing criminal charges even against asylum seekers.

"Senator Cruz has released another factually incorrect attack ad," said O'Rourke spokesman Chris Evans. "As the senator's campaign knows, Beto was very clearly addressing asylum seekers in his August remarks to the Huffington Post. ... This is false."

Earlier this month, Cruz released a heavily spliced attack ad that falsely portrayed comments in which the challenger lauded NFL players who protest police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem. That ad cut most of a four-minute answer from an O'Rourke town hall campaign event, making it appear — inaccurately — that he said he was "grateful" for people who burn the American flag.

The attack over decriminalizing border crossings is less black and white.

The Cruz ad released on Wednesday, titled "Deported," highlights cases of three criminals who were deported over and over — one had been sent out of the country 20 times — only to return and commit murder or sexual assault. One of the men fatally shot Kate Steinle in San Francisco after being deported five times.

Cruz has pushed for legislation to crack down on repeat offenders who keep coming back after being deported.

"He introduced Kate's Law, to impose tough penalties on criminals who sneak into our country over and over again. We need a leader to stop the chaos at the border," the narrator says in the new Cruz ad.

The ad quotes the Democrat as discussing the possibility of abolishing the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, saying, "I'm open to doing that."

When O'Rourke said that, however, he emphasized that even if ICE were disbanded, its responsibilities would not go away. They would shifted to some other agency. Cruz routinely glosses over that part of O'Rourke's comments, and the Democrat has not advocated dismantling the agency.

The ad also asserts that "Beto O'Rourke said crossing the border illegally should not be a crime."

But that's a paraphrase of a news account that leaves a false impression.

"These asylum-seekers — penniless, at wits' end, after surviving three weeks on the road, very often with their children — then attempt to do what I think any human would do, which is to request asylum in between the ports of entry. We should not criminalize that," O'Rourke told the Huffington Post last month, in comments that largely mirror remarks he makes regularly at campaign events.

The Cruz campaign attributes the allegation in its ad to a story in the conservative Washington Examiner that in turn cites a story from the liberal Huffington Post. Both have headlines that support the contention in the Cruz ad, but which turn out not to be accurate regarding O'Rourke.

The Examiner's story is titled "Top Texas Democrats want to decriminalize unauthorized border crossings."

Huffpo's story is titled "It's Time To Decriminalize Immigration, Say Top Texas Dems."

Huffpo reported that Lupe Valdez, the Democratic nominee for governor, and Veronica Escobar, nominated to fill the El Paso congressional seat that O'Rourke is vacating, want to end the criminal prosecution of people who cross the border illegally. Before the George W. Bush administration, such crossings were typically treated as civil violations rather than as a federal crime.

The story goes on to say that O'Rourke has argued for a much narrower exception, to protect asylum seekers — not migrants in general — from criminal prosecution.

Crossing the border illegally for the first time is a misdemeanor that carries a sentence of up to six months. Repeat offenders can face up to 20 years.

People seeking asylum can request asylum at a port of entry. U.S. law allows anyone in the country, with or without authorization, to request asylum within a year of arrival. But the Trump administration has created a catch-22; there are numerous reports of asylum seekers being turned away from ports of entry — making it impossible to assert their rights under U.S. law.

As Huffpo wrote: "O'Rourke, who has mounted a competitive campaign to oust Republican Sen. Ted Cruz from his seat, offered more cautious remarks, focusing primarily on the tens of thousands of mostly Central American asylum-seekers who have crossed into the U.S. in recent years. The Trump administration has repeatedly turned away migrant families seeking to enter the U.S. at legal ports of entry, O'Rourke noted."