The White House is denying the claim that a US National Security Council (NSC) official suggested that a preemptive strike on North Korea could help the Republican Party in the midterm elections.

On Saturday, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders slammed a Wall Street Journal reporter on Twitter, after he tweeted an article which claimed that the senior director for Asian affairs at the NSC, Matthew Pottinger, advocated for a possible military strike on North Korea in order to boost political support for the GOP, which is facing a defeat at the hand of Democrats in November's midterm elections.

All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 34 of the 100 seats in the Senate will be contested. Thirty-nine state and territorial governorships and numerous other state and local elections will also be contested.

Sanders was responding to a tweet by the Journal's Seoul bureau chief Jonathan Cheng, who posted an article, published by South Korean newspaper Hankyoreh, regarding Pottinger’s alleged suggestion. Cheng later on deleted the tweet.

The alleged quote from Pottinger was initially included in an earlier article by the Hankyoreh newspaper's Washington correspondent.

According to Business Insider, the Korean version of the Hankyoreh article states that Pottinger said that a limited military strike on North Korea might help the Republican Party's political odds in the midterm elections.

Tensions are running high between Washington and Pyongyang over North Korea's missile and nuclear programs.

The Trump administration claims it prefers a diplomatic solution to the crisis, but it also says that all options are on the table, including military ones.

Washington insists that any future talks should be aimed at North Korea giving up its nuclear weapons, something Pyongyang rejects.

Trump has repeatedly threatened the possibility of attacking North Korea, warning that he would "totally destroy" the country if necessary.

Some independent analysts are concerned that Trump might see a military confrontation with North Korea as a viable option to bolster support for him and his party in the face of his falling approval ratings.