Lutnick Tapped to Vet Pentagon Deals Tied to Cerberus Capital

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has been tapped by the Department of Defense to review any transactions between the Pentagon and companies tied to Cerberus Capital Management. The assignment lands him in the middle of one of Washington’s messier conflict-of-interest setups.

Why Lutnick, and why now

Cerberus, the private equity firm founded by Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg, has sprawling holdings in the national security space, including companies that have won contracts with the Defense Department during his time in office.

Feinberg divested his personal holdings in Cerberus when he took the role, but critics have focused on what he did not divest: assets sitting in family trusts that still benefit members of his household. The DoD’s answer, at least for Cerberus-specific deals, is to hand the review to someone outside the building.

The conflict inside the conflict

The catch: Lutnick has his own ties to Cerberus. Cantor Fitzgerald, the investment bank Lutnick led before becoming commerce secretary, has helped Cerberus oversee its investment funds since at least 2012, according to public filings, and Cantor, now run by Lutnick’s sons, is the prime broker for an assortment of Cerberus funds.

Cantor and its subsidiary Newmark partnered with Cerberus on big-ticket financings for a Los Angeles office tower, a Prime Data Centers project, and distribution centers serving Albertsons supermarkets, and Newmark also arranged a new headquarters lease for Cerberus at 875 Third Ave. in Manhattan.

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Cerberus portfolio companies in the crosshairs

Cerberus-owned firms have landed recent awards: M1 Support Services disclosed a 26-year training contract with a $10 billion cap, and Stratolaunch won a $90 million Pentagon deal a year earlier; Cerberus took a controlling stake in M1 in 2024.

ProPublica and TPM reported in March 2026 that Cerberus owns or is a majority investor in at least four companies that have received Golden Dome-related awards: North Wind, Stratolaunch, Red River Technology, and NetCentrics.

The bigger Pentagon-PE story

The DoD has been actively developing investment strategies modeled on private equity mechanics, with programs targeting up to $200B in deployment, and bipartisan criticism has followed, with lawmakers questioning whether the Pentagon’s new investment posture creates structural incentives for insiders to steer contracts toward firms they know well.

In January, the OSC announced its first deal with a weapons maker since Feinberg took office: a $1 billion equity investment in L3Harris, intended to help L3Harris spin off Aerojet Rocketdyne into a separate, publicly traded entity that would give the government a stake in a rocket motor company that has partnered with Cerberus’ Stratolaunch.

Options market and stocks to watch

Watch defense primes and Cerberus-adjacent names for headline risk as the review process kicks off:

• LHX: L3Harris sits at the center of the OSC’s $1B equity deal and the Aerojet Rocketdyne spin — watch for flow around any structural changes.
• LMT: Analysts have already asked why Lockheed did not receive similar OSC funding — watch for competitive positioning commentary.
• RTX: Same setup as Lockheed on the missile-interceptor side — watch for reactions if the review reshapes deal pipelines.
• ACI: Albertsons is tied into Cerberus real estate financings via Cantor and Newmark — watch for any tangential headlines.

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