This Trump Cabinet secretary could be 'forced to take the fall' for tariff chaos

11 March

U.S. President Donald Trump sits in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 7, 2025. REUTERS/Leah Millis

Financial markets are still reeling from this week's back-and-forth with the United States' key trade partners, as President Donald Trump announced and then almost immediately withdrew crippling new tariffs.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed Tuesday down another 478 points, down 1.1%. Trading on the S&P 500 closed after a decline of 0.7%, and the Nasdaq Composite was down 0.2%, for the worst day of trading since September according to Yahoo Finance. The stock market has been sliding amid fears that consumer spending would contract in response to tariffs Trump announced would be going into effect on Canada and Mexico in particular. While those tariffs have been reversed for now, Trump has indicated that 50% tariffs on imported steel and aluminum from Canada will still go into effect early Wednesday morning at midnight.

Trump has attempted to boost investor confidence by walking back his previous comments to Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo in which he didn't rule out a recession happening as soon as this year. But Politico reported Tuesday that one of his top Cabinet secretaries may be "forced to take the fall," with "few friends in the administration" left to defend him.

According to the outlet, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick — who co-chaired Trump's presidential transition team along with former World Wrestling Entertainment executive Linda McMahon (now Trump's secretary of education) — could be out of a job if the fallout over Trump's tariffs continues to roil markets. One unnamed source "close to the administration" told Politico that Lutnick was lately "trying to be a mini-Trump."

“I don’t think he got the memo that only Trump gets to be Trump,” the source said. “It just reinforces that he doesn’t really know how to do the job.”

Politico additionally reported that administration officials are "growing increasingly frustrated" with the commerce secretary, complaining that he often gets "out in front" of Trump and has "contradicted his messaging." They add that he has "a lack of understanding of even the basics about how tariffs and the economy work."

Last week, Lutnick made headlines after telling CNBC that "prices are going to rise" as a result of tariffs, but that companies can avoid tariffs by making their products in the United States. When hosts reminded him that companies offshore production because labor costs are lower, Lutnick proclaimed that manufacturing jobs would be done by "robots."

Click here to read Politico's report in its entirety.

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