A new book by veteran Watergate reporter Bob Woodward says Donald Trump secretly sent Vladimir Putin coveted Covid-19 tests for personal use when they were in short supply, a claim angrily denied by the Trump campaign.

The book, titled “War,” also contains the allegation that Trump has remained in secret contact with Putin since leaving office, according to excerpts cited by U.S. media.

The Trump campaign said none of these “made-up stories” were true.

“President Trump has given him absolutely no access to this garbage book that either belongs in the bargain bin of the fiction section of a discount bookstore or is used as toilet paper,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement to the BBC.

Woodward, who became famous for his role in uncovering the Watergate scandal that derailed Richard Nixon’s presidency, has written several best-selling books based on access to high-level sources.

A Trump campaign spokesman called Woodward “insane” and “deranged” and said: “Woodward is an angry little man and is clearly upset because President Trump is successfully suing him for releasing previous recordings without permission.”

Trump previously spoke with Woodward for the journalist’s 2021 book titled Rage. He later sued him over it, claiming that Woodward did not have permission to release recordings of their interviews, a claim the author denied.

The new book traces the ongoing communication between the former president and Putin to a single Trump staffer who is not named in the book.

According to a report by the New York TimesThe book describes a scene in which a Trump aide was ordered out of Trump’s office at Mar-a-Lago so that the former president could have a conversation with Putin.

The unnamed adviser reportedly said the two may have spoken half a dozen times since Trump left the White House in 2021.

The book doesn’t say what they discussed, and it quotes a Trump campaign official expressing doubt about the alleged contact.

According to Woodward, Trump “secretly sent Putin a bunch of Abbott Point of Care Covid testing machines for his personal use” while the former president was in office.

According to the retelling of Woodward’s book in US media, Putin was reportedly afraid of contracting the virus.

The report adds that Putin asked Trump not to publicly say he sent him the tests for fear it would damage Trump’s reputation.

“I don’t want you to tell anyone because then people will get mad at you, not me,” Putin reportedly told Trump, according to the book cited by the Times.

Trump reportedly said, “I don’t care. Fine.”

The claims have raised renewed questions about the relationship between Trump and Putin just weeks before the Nov. 5 election.

The former president has been accused in the past of working with Russia to interfere in US elections. However, a Justice Department investigation found no evidence of this and did not conclude whether Trump had obstructed the investigation.

The book also examines the long shadow Trump has cast over the foreign conflicts of the past four years and the bitter U.S. political environment in which they unfolded, it says the Washington Post.

It also includes candid assessments from President Joe Biden of his own missteps, including his decision to nominate Merrick Garland as attorney general.

Responding to the prosecution of his son Hunter – by a special prosecutor appointed by Garland – the president told an aide: “I should never have picked Garland,” the Post reported.