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Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, right, stands next to Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., as Sessions speaks during a rally Sunday, Feb. 28, 2016, in Madison, Ala. Trump names Sessions chairman of national security committee

Donald Trump has named Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions the chairman of his national security advisory committee, the Republican frontrunner's campaign announced Thursday evening.

Sessions, who became the first senator to endorse Trump earlier this week, will advise the candidate on matters of foreign policy and national security.

"We need to understand the limits of our ability to intervene successfully in other nations," said Sessions, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, in a statement. "It is time for a healthy dose of foreign policy realism. In the Middle East, this means forming partnerships based on shared interests, not merely overthrowing regimes in the dangerous attempt to plant democracies."

The announcement by Trump comes while he's trying to pivot to the general election with a "common-sense conservative" message, as he put it when discussing his views on Planned Parenthood on Tuesday. Trump's campaign said it will announce more advisers on national security and on other issues "over the next few weeks."

Sessions reiterated his support for safe zones in the Middle East as a means to keep migrants from coming to the United States and elsewhere. "The only path to long-term stability and resolution of this humanitarian crisis for the United States and our European allies is to work towards the safe return of migrants to their home countries, as Mr. Trump has noted," Session said. "This strategy will also protect our own national security.”

"A national-interest foreign policy, combined with a military second to none, stands in contrast to interventionist ideas that could enmesh us further in the region's chaos," Sessions said. "After over a decade of war and conflict, this country has a host of smart, experienced, and proven leaders. That wisdom must be sought. These meetings will be the beginning of a process that Mr. Trump has called for and which he believes must result in a clear and realistic bipartisan global strategy that will guide our nation for years to come.”