Will Trump Finally End the Bannon-Kushner War?

The only thing likely protecting Steve Bannon’s job is the fact that everyone in Washington expects he’s about to lose it. Administration officials inside the West Wing are already acting as if Bannon is halfway out the door. On Meet the PressSunday, National security adviser H.R. McMaster refused to say he was willing to work with the president’s chief strategist. Aides told Politico recently they expect new chief of staff John Kelly to “push Bannon out in the coming weeks.”

And as Maggie Haberman and Glenn Thrush report in the New York Times, some of Trump’s most trusted outside advisers are urging him to dump Bannon as well, including recently ousted communications director Anthony Scaramucci, longtime political guru Roger Stone, and media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

“At a recent dinner at the White House with Mr. [Jared] Kushner and Mr. Kelly, before Mr. Trump decamped for a working vacation at his private golf club in Bedminster, N.J., the president listened while one of the guests, Mr. Murdoch, a founder of Fox News, said Mr. Bannon had to go,” the Times reports. “Mr. Trump offered little pushback, according to a person familiar with the conversation, and vented his frustrations about Mr. Bannon. Mr. Murdoch is close to Mr. Kushner, who has been in open warfare with Mr. Bannon since the spring.”

Bannon has been considering leaving the White House for some time as his stock has fallen with President Trump. It’s not clear how much work Bannon has since the folding of his attempted in-house think tank known as the Strategic Initiatives Group, which never really got off the ground and was swallowed up by the Office of American Innovation run by rival Jared Kushner. Sources say Bannon has taken to spending much of his time in the West Wing on his smartphone. The departure of his inter-office ally, Reince Priebus, has made him lonelier still.

But despite a slimmer portfolio, his proximity to the president means Bannon still plays a role in trying to influence policy, including most recently the internal White House debate over Afghanistan. Bannon also has Trump’s ear on other aspects of his presidency. “Despite being marginalized, Mr. Bannon consulted with the president repeatedly over the weekend as Mr. Trump struggled to respond to the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville, Va,” the Times reports. “In general, Mr. Bannon has cautioned the president not to criticize far-right activists too severely for fear of antagonizing a small but energetic part of his base.”