Sen. Richard Shelby Richard Craig ShelbySenate GOP eyes early exit Dems discussing government funding bill into February GOP short of votes on Trump's controversial Fed pick MORE (R-Ala.) on Tuesday defended Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsGOP set to release controversial Biden report Trump's policies on refugees are as simple as ABCs Ocasio-Cortez, Velázquez call for convention to decide Puerto Rico status MORE and the South amid reporting in Bob Woodward's forthcoming book that President Trump Donald John TrumpOmar fires back at Trump over rally remarks: 'This is my country' Pelosi: Trump hurrying to fill SCOTUS seat so he can repeal ObamaCare Trump mocks Biden appearance, mask use ahead of first debate MORE had demeaned both.

“I guess the president, he says what he thinks," Shelby told reporters at the Capitol.

"I think the president’s probably got a lot of respect for the South, I hope so," he added. "He did well there. Without the South he wouldn’t be the president of the United States.”

The first excerpts from Woodward's new book were published Tuesday morning, and featured a handful of examples of Trump bad-mouthing his closest aides. The president mocked Sessions’s accent, and reportedly described him to a staffer as “mentally retarded. He’s this dumb Southerner.”

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“He couldn’t even be a one-person country lawyer down in Alabama,” Trump said, according to Woodward’s book.

Trump denied on Tuesday that he called Sessions "mentally retarded" or a "dumb southerner," tweeting that being a Southerner is a "GREAT thing."

The already discredited Woodward book, so many lies and phony sources, has me calling Jeff Sessions “mentally retarded” and “a dumb southerner.” I said NEITHER, never used those terms on anyone, including Jeff, and being a southerner is a GREAT thing. He made this up to divide! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 4, 2018

Sessions has been a favorite punching bag for Trump, who has noted repeatedly that he would not have nominated the former Alabama senator for the job if he knew Sessions would recuse himself from overseeing the Mueller investigation.

Trump recently chastised his attorney general for bringing charges against two Republican congressmen, suggesting that the decision could endanger the GOP's chances in November's midterms.

In the face of growing criticism, Sessions issued a statement late last month that he would “not be improperly influenced” by political pressure.

Trump told Bloomberg in an interview on Thursday that Sessions will remain in his job at least until the November midterm elections. The president declined to comment when asked if he would keep his attorney general on beyond that.

Niv Elis contributed to this story.