Trump administration officials and advisers have made a string of overseas campaign trips for vulnerable leaders to Europe, the Middle East and even the little-known enclave Republika Srpska.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was the latest member of Trump’s team to make what could be viewed as a campaign stop favoring a foreign ally, meeting Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a base in southern Israel that hosts American refueling planes and fighter jets. Israel’s elections are next Tuesday.

Vice President JD Vance visited Hungary earlier this year to support Viktor Orbán’s ultimately unsuccessful campaign. Two of Trump’s political advisers leading his midterm advertising effort, James Blair and Chris LaCivita, last month went to Republika Srpska, a self-governing territory in Bosnia and Herzegovina, to support a pro-Russia party that won in the Oct. 4 elections.

American administrations usually make special effort to avoid any perception of favoring candidates in overseas elections, even if they have favorites behind the scenes.

But Trump’s team has brought its preferences out in the open, going so far as to appear at campaign rallies or, in Hegseth’s case, traveling to Israel a day after Trump endorsed Netanyahu.

White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said Trump “will speak or work with anyone, and he makes no secret about those he likes or supports.”

Trump is the first U.S. president to explicitly and publicly endorse a candidate in an Israeli election, which is scheduled for Oct. 27. U.S. military officials, including defense secretaries, have generally avoided appearing to engage in political activities in the U.S. and overseas.

Doron Spielman, a spokesperson for Netanyahu, said the pair discussed regional threats and Trump’s endorsement for the Israeli premier. Trump and his national security team have weighed restarting military action against Tehran, but Trump has said the U.S. would not act before the midterm elections.

In April, JD Vance attended an election rally in Budapest alongside Hungary’s then-Prime Minister Orbán just five days before the country went to the polls. “We have got to get Viktor Orbán re-elected as prime minister of Hungary, don’t we?” Vance said to 1,000 Orbán supporters. Orbán, part of a group of political conservatives the Trump administration has expressed affinity for, ultimately lost the race.

Blair and LaCivita, former White House aides who are leading Republicans’ midterm election strategy, earlier this month took a break from the U.S. campaign trail to visit Republika Srpska to work on behalf of the country’s ruling party that faced an Oct. 4 election.

Trump’s allies have praised the ruling party, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, for its embrace of Christian conservatism and opposition to joining the European Union.

Trump responded to criticism of LaCivita and Blair’s trip on Truth Social, saying they are “outside consultants” who “are allowed to do work for others.” He said he would “terminate them immediately” if the pair presented a conflict of interest. Blair flew with Trump on Air Force One to Kansas on Monday. 

While Trump and his team have been the most overt with their foreign political preferences, the phenomenon is not totally without precedent.

President Barack Obama took the unusual step of calling on the United Kingdom to remain in the EU while he was visiting London in April 2016. He wrote an op-ed against Brexit in the British newspaper The Telegraph timed to his visit and also made his case during a press conference.

“The U.K. is at its best when it’s helping to lead a strong European Union,” he said at the time.

He and his administration also faced criticism for what some perceived to be a Democratic intervention in the 2015 Israeli elections. A Senate probe found that a group known as V15, aimed at ousting Netanyahu, received nearly $350,000 in grant money from the State Department. The U.S. had initially given the money to a group aimed to foster support for peace between Israel and the Palestinian territories but the organization later morphed to help set up political infrastructure for the V15 campaign against Netanyahu.

Jeremy Bird, a former national field director for the Obama campaign, worked with the V15 group, with his participation adding to the controversy.

David Rohde contributed reporting.

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