attack fax
n. A fax transmission, usually sent to the media, that attacks the ideas or conduct of an opponent or rival.
Examples
1997
The public never sees them, but campaigns use them to shape the conventional wisdom, and they made their first major appearance in the governor's race last week.

We're talking about attack faxes, the one- and two-page missives that clog newsroom fax machines day after day as candidates bash one another.
—Kelly Richmond, “Capital Talk,” The Record, April 06, 1997
1993
The Clinton strategists…responded to the daily "Attack Fax" from the Bush campaign. (The Bush campaign used the facsimile machine to send off daily diatribes against Clinton to newspapers and local Bush campaign offices.)
—Christine M. Black, “The Pursuit of the Presidency,” Oryx Press, November 16, 1993
1988 (earliest)
And while we're creating categories please do not classify this letter as "junk fax." It is "fan fax." But if you cross me again, the next one will be "attack fax."
—Robert E. Hope, “Letters: As a Matter of Fax,” New York Magazine, December 12, 1988
Filed Under