Former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon has piled up criticism that Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick is making too many flavours during his media appearance.
Bannon, a strategist in Trump’s first administration, argued that Lutnick should be yankled from television because the White House needs a unified message on trade policy.
“I don’t know why Ratnic is still doing the media. Let me do something dull,” Bannon said Monday on the podcast “The War Room.”
“I think he’s close to an unmitigated disaster. I’m sure he’ll see less Rutnik on TV,” he added.
He praised the other members of the administration, particularly Treasury Secretary Scott Bescent, for being selective in media interviews they accept.
“We need people to have a clear message to understand what the process is,” Bannon said.
Lutnick, who confirmed the cabinet’s main role in February, became the go-to for President Trump’s tariffs, but he provided conflicting opinions on the topic and created various fakes on live television.
“There is a way to have a transaction order that puts America first, American citizens first and most important, and we can bring America back to high value manufacturing,” Bannon said.
“No, Howard Lutnick, it’s not all done by robots. We’re not doing this, so we can set up some robots to live a better life,” Bannon said.
This was delving into one of Lutnick’s latest mistakes when it was made while talking to Fox News host Jesse Waters earlier this month.
“What happens is that robotics will replace the cheap labor we’ve seen all over the world,” Lutnick told Waters.
“Our high school education people, they’re going to train to do robotics mechanics. It’s kind of a super-charged BMW mechanic. You can fix those robots,” continues Lutnick.
The Secretary of Commerce, former CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, also confirmed some of his statements. He initially promised that there would be no recession, and then added that if there was a recession it would be “worthy.”
Lutnick made other suspicious comments during the media appearances. Only “con artists” complain about the lack of social security checks or hint that Fox News viewers will encourage them to buy Tesla stock.
His television appearances have been so challenging for the White House that he was asked to restrain them last month, The Wall Street Journal reported last week.
Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman publicly criticized the Commerce Secretary’s comments, particularly his indifference when US stocks fought last week.
“I just understand why @howardlutnick is crashing in the stock market and the economy,” Ackman wrote in X’s post.
“It’s a bad idea for a company to choose a secretary of commerce, who has leveraged long bonds. It’s an irreconcilable conflict of interest,” he continued, but he later returned the comment in another social media post.
