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Ted Cruz's wife, Heidi Cruz, is pictured. | AP Photo Trump tweets threat about Cruz's wife

Donald Trump tweeted and then deleted a message Tuesday evening that threatened to "spill the beans" about Ted Cruz's wife, Heidi. Then he tweeted again.

"Wow @SenTedCruz, that is some low level ad you did using a picture of Melania in a G.Q. shoot.Be careful or I will spill the beans on your wife," Trump tweeted, before deleting the message seconds later.

Trump's tweet is an apparent reference to the anti-Trump super PAC Make America Awesome, not affiliated with Cruz's campaign, running Facebook ads featuring a photo of Trump's wife posing nude for British GQ in 2000.

Minutes later, Trump tweeted, "Lyin' Ted Cruz just used a picture of Melania from a G.Q. shoot in his ad. Be careful, Lyin' Ted, or I will spill the beans on your wife!"

Cruz responded less than 30 minutes later, tweeting, "Pic of your wife not from us. Donald, if you try to attack Heidi, you're more of a coward than I thought. #classless"

Liz Mair, who co-founded the anti-Trump super PAC, took to Twitter to set Trump straight about the ad's provenance.

.@realDonaldTrump Hi Donald, I know you're really upset about that ad, but it was Make America Awesome's, not Ted Cruz's. — Liz Mair (@LizMair) March 23, 2016





Donald Trump is so desperate to beat Cruz that his team has been pushing around rumors she's a criminal w a mental illness for weeks now. — Liz Mair (@LizMair) March 23, 2016





Trumpkins whining about our ad have been referencing this in lots of emails to you. There, @realDonaldTrump, consider your "thunder" stolen. — Liz Mair (@LizMair) March 23, 2016





Presumably, the reason @realDonaldTrump hasn't said what his campaign has apparently been pushing his followers to say about Heidi... — Liz Mair (@LizMair) March 23, 2016





...b/c @realDonaldTrump knows there's a little thing called defamation law. Which doesn't apply to our ad bc the Melania pic is real. LOLZ. — Liz Mair (@LizMair) March 23, 2016



Heidi Cruz took an upaid absence as an managing director with Goldman Sachs last year after her husband began his presidential campaign. Cruz met her husband while working on the George W. Bush campaign in 2000, marrying in 2001.

While it is unclear what Trump could be referring to with respect to Cruz's wife, BuzzFeed News reported last March on a heavily redacted 2005 police report where Heidi Cruz was spotted sitting on the ground near a Texas highway outside of Austin. According to the report itself, Heidi Cruz displayed no "signs of intoxication."

“About a decade ago, when Mrs. Cruz returned from D.C. to Texas and faced a significant professional transition, she experienced a brief bout of depression,” Jason Miller, an adviser to Cruz, said in a statement to BuzzFeed News at the time, in response to inquiries. “Like millions of Americans, she came through that struggle with prayer, Christian counseling, and the love and support of her husband and family.”

