Howard Lutnick is the Trump adviser Wall Street loves to hate

Wall Street has been venting its outrage on Howard Lutnick over the tariffs.While the president’s controversial Commerce Secretary looks like an easy target, it’s worth asking whether he’s the right one.As someone inside the White House recently reminded me: “A lot of people on Wall Street don’t like Howard, but they’re acting like this is his tariff policy – not the president’s.”   True, though in the past, I too have sounded the alarm on Lutnick’s role in Trump’s tariff war, specifically his ability (or inability) to promote the clear necessity to fix something that based on all the evidence continues to undermine the US interests.

It would be nice to manufacture more stuff here as well.China has been screwing us for years.Yet selling it is key: The bond market, even more than stocks, keeps the country’s lights on and there are growing signs that the credit markets hate the administration’s uneven policies, and explanation of those policies.

One day we have massive tariffs, the next day there is a pause.One day we have an exemption for tech companies, the next day we don’t.Lutnick is out there bloviating about all of the above, making the situation worse, his critics contend.

Among his many gems to defend Trump’s World War Tariff is that it will magically create lots of new factory jobs, or in Lutnick speak: An army “of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones — that kind of thing will come back to the America, it’s going to be automated, and great Americans, the tradecraft of America, is going to fix them, is going to work on them.”Yes, not good.That’s why behind the scenes, there’s a “Fire Lutnick” movement by Wall Street executives, lobbying key Trump aides to get him out of the tariff picture ASAP, get him reassigned to more mundane tasks like traveling the country visiting local chambers of commerce.The movement picked up steam over the weekend after markets were prepar...