Gold Star Father Khizr Khan: Deaths Of Green Berets In Niger Made Into 'Political Football'

Khizr Khan, the Gold Star father who spoke at the Democratic National Convention in 2016 delivering a public rebuke to then candidate Donald Trump that led to Trump engaging in a feud between Khan and his wife, Ghazala Khan, spoke about the remarks made by White House Chief of Staff General John Kelly this week about Gold Star families.

Kelly spoke at a press briefing at the White House earlier this week, criticizing Rep. Frederica Wilson, a Democrat from Florida, for listening in on a call the president made the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson and mischaracterized a speech she made at the naming of an FBI building in Florida, labeling her an "empty barrel." Kelly also lamented the idea that Gold Star families, women and religion may no longer be "sacred."

"Gold Star families, I think that left in the convention over the summer," Kelly said. "But I just thought -- the selfless devotion that brings a man or woman to die on the battlefield, I just thought that that might be sacred."

Asked about Kelly's remarks on CBS Face The Nation, Khan said he acknowledged General Kelly's sacrifices and service and that of his family's as well. Kelly himself is a Gold Star father whose son, Lt. Robert Kelly, was killed in Afghanistan in 2010. Khan said that as a citizen Kelly should have refrained from doing exactly the same thing he was complaining about.

He also said the families of the four fallen Green Berets who were killed in Niger deserve the utmost dignity, privacy and respect at this moment.

Watch: Niger Ambush: Here's What We Know So Far

"That should have been quoted when this matter came to public," Khan said. "But that had not been done. It had been made political football."

He also said he was shocked to see Kelly stand alongside the president when he could not find the right words to condemn the neo-Nazis and white supremacists who descended on the city of Charlottesville in August, participating in a deadly riot that left 32-year-old Heather Heyer dead and injured dozens others.

Khan, who is a resident of Charlottesville, was also on the show to talk about his new book, "An American Family: A Memoir of Hope and Sacrifice." Khan's son, Captain Humayun Khan, was killed in Iraq.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images News/Getty Images