The calls by President Donald Trump are expected to eventually be followed by formal endorsements, GOP senators said. | Alex Wong/Getty Images Trump offers support to GOP senators in Bannon’s cross hairs The president promised to back three incumbent Republicans, giving a boost to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell amid the party’s civil war.

President Donald Trump called three Republican senators this week and expressed support for their 2018 re-election bids, aligning with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in the senator's intra-party feud with Steve Bannon.

Trump dialed GOP Sens. John Barrasso of Wyoming, Deb Fischer of Nebraska and Roger Wicker of Mississippi, according to five people familiar with the calls. He promised to help the three senators against any insurgent challengers, one of these people said, and said he hoped they would be reelected.


The calls are expected to eventually be followed by formal endorsements, GOP senators said. Wicker, Barrasso and Fischer declined to comment on private discussions with the president. Wicker wasn't available for comment. Bannon has criticized both Fischer and Barrasso and has told people he would like state Sen. Chris McDaniel to beat Wicker.

"The president has been very supportive, and Senator Barrasso is grateful that President Trump would take the time to call him directly to express his support," said Dan Kunsman, a top aide to Barrasso.

A White House spokesman didn't immediately respond to a request for comment, and a representative for Bannon declined to comment.

Republicans hope to avoid spending money protecting incumbents in primaries and instead focus on defeating the 10 Senate Democrats representing states Trump won. They hope Trump will go further and make a public statement of support for the senators.

“I hope he will. I think he will,” said Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, a GOP leader. “They are the kind of people he needs to get his agenda done.”

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The three incumbent senators have the strong support of McConnell, who has said that many of the anti-establishment candidates Bannon and others may support don't have a path to victory in general elections. Many of McConnell's top advisers and allies consider Bannon a political charlatan interested in mischief-making.

"You have to nominate people who can actually win," McConnell said in the Rose Garden. "Winners make policy, losers go home."

Bannon has said privately the trio are among the senators he would like to unseat, and the former Trump strategist has zigzagged the country, looking for candidates and donors. He has bragged repeatedly about trying to take McConnell down, though the majority leader still enjoys considerable support in his conference. "We've cut your oxygen off, Mitch, OK," Bannon told conservative activists last weekend.

Trump has given mixed signals to Bannon's efforts, saying he understands why Bannon is doing it but that he might also try to dissuade him.

"We're not getting the job done folks," Trump said Monday morning, when asked about Bannon's political efforts in the Roosevelt Room. He added: "I'm not going to blame myself."

By Monday afternoon, standing with McConnell in the Rose Garden, Trump said he would try to talk Bannon out of some of his moves. When meeting with Trump in the Oval Office on Monday, McConnell made a practical case on why the president should support incumbents without mentioning Bannon by name, people familiar with the meeting said.

The former chief strategist has been buoyed by Roy Moore’s victory in Alabama’s primary race, where Bannon surged into the state in the final weeks and saw Moore resoundingly defeat GOP Sen. Luther Strange, the candidate backed by Trump and McConnell.

Senators said privately that they doubt Bannon’s political acumen and say he merely associated himself with the insurgent Moore, who already had strong support among conservatives and had twice been elected statewide.

“Bannon’s claiming Roy Moore. Hell, he didn’t have anything to do with that,” said one GOP senator.