McMaster Won’t Say If He Can Work With Steve Bannon

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By Daniel J. Solomon August 14, 2017

Steve Bannon’s spat with H.R. McMaster is showing no signs of letting up, with the national security adviser refusing to explicitly say that he’s willing to work with the chief White House strategist.

“I get to work together with a broad range of talented people. And it is a privilege every day to enable the national security team,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” when asked about his working relationship with Bannon.

Asked again whether the two could cooperate, he pointedly repeated the same phrase.

McMaster has been seen as a national security moderate within the administration, less willing than Bannon to frame the fight against terrorism as a struggle against Islam.

McMaster is said to have pushed for Bannon’s ouster from the National Security Council as a condition for him becoming national security adviser. The bad blood has continued as Bannon’s former outlet, Breitbart News, has run a slew of negative stories about McMaster.

Contact Daniel J. Solomon at solomon@forward.com or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon

Daniel J. Solomon is the former Assistant to the Editor/News Writer at the Forward. Originally from Queens, he attended Harvard as an undergraduate, where he wrote his senior thesis on French-Jewish intellectual history. He is excited to have returned to New York after his time in Massachusetts. Daniel’s passions include folk music, cycling, and pointed argument.

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