White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told a reporter Friday that it would be "highly inappropriate" to question chief of staff John Kelly John Francis KellyMORE's criticism about a Florida congresswoman that has since been called into question.

Kelly, who served as a four-star Marine general before joining the administration, accused Rep. Frederica Wilson Frederica Patricia WilsonHarris calls it 'outrageous' Trump downplayed coronavirus House passes bill establishing commission to study racial disparities affecting Black men, boys Florida county official apologizes for social media post invoking Hitler MORE (D-Fla.) of grandstanding during a 2015 event dedicating an FBI building to fallen agents by taking credit for securing funding for the building.

But while video from the event published by the Sun-Sentinel newspaper in South Florida showed Wilson talking about her legislation naming the building for the agents, she did not talk about winning funding for it.

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When pressed on the issue, Sanders argued that Kelly had been referring to comments she made at the event off camera. She went on to needle Wilson as "all hat, no cattle," and pushed back when a reporter asked Kelly to defend his characterization.

"If you want to go after Gen. Kelly, that's up to you. But I think that if you want to get into a debate with a 4-star Marine general, that's something that's highly inappropriate," she said.

The accusations are the latest in the fallout surrounding a phone call President Trump made to the family of a soldier who died in an ambush in Niger. Wilson told reporters that Trump had been insensitive in his conversation, a characterization disputed by Trump and the White House while backed up by the soldier's mother.

Kelly, whose son died in combat in 2010, came to the White House briefing room on Thursday to defend Trump from those accusations. That was when he levied his own criticism at Wilson.