Alabama senator defends Sessions: Trump wouldn't be president without the South
By Brett Samuels - 09/05/18 11:01 AM EDT
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) on Tuesday defended Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the South amid reporting in Bob Woodward's forthcoming book that Trump had demeaned both.
“I guess the president, he says what he thinks," Shelby told The Washington Post.
"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.â€
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’ accent, and described him to a staffer as “mentally retarded. He’s this dumb Southerner.â€
“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."
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http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/405141-alabama-senator-defends-sessions-trump-wouldnt-be-president-without-the-south