President Donald Trump said before a cabinet meeting Monday that he sympathizes with former chief strategist Steve Bannon’s targeting of incumbent Republican senators.
Bannon, now back at the helm of Breitbart News, is waging a “war” against the GOP establishment, and said he plans to back efforts to oust every Republican senator up for election in 2018, except Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
“Steve is very committed. He’s a friend of mine and he’s very committed to getting things passed,” Trump told reporters when asked about Bannon’s battle against Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The president added that “we’re not getting the job done and I’m not going to blame myself. I‘ll be honest.”
“I can understand where Steve Bannon is coming from,” Trump continued. He later said, “There are some Republicans, frankly, that should be ashamed of themselves.”
Republican lawmakers have not been able to deliver an Obamacare repeal bill to the Oval Office, and Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff cited this failure at a private event in which he doubted that tax reform will be accomplished.
While Bannon has talked a big talk when it comes to the 2018 midterms, it is unclear how powerful he really is. Breitbart’s last chosen candidate Roy Moore succeeded in the Alabama senate primary against Sen. Luther Strange, but the site failed when it pushed Paul Nehlen to upset Paul Ryan and Kelli Ward to defeat John McCain.