Jamie Dimon has hinted that he’s seeking to the future in politics, prompting hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman to endorse JPMorgan Chase CEO for president in 2024.
“I really like my country and perhaps at some point I’ll serve it in one capability or one other,” Dimon, 67, told Bloomberg TV on Wednesday when asked if he would ever consider public office.
But Dimon also stressed that he was focused on running the Wall Street banking giant.
“I really like what I do,” Dimon, who spoke at JPMorgan’s annual Global China Summit in Shanghai, told Bloomberg.
Dimon said that “business is usually a force for good” and described himself as a “red-blooded, full-throated free enterprise capitalist.”
“Everyone knows I’m a patriot,” said Dimon.
Dimon’s comments prompted Ackman to praise him as an “exemplary leader” who “managed” JPMorgan, the nation’s largest bank, “brilliantly” through the crises.
“Our country is liable to $32 trillion in debt and there isn’t any end in sight to massive deficits heading into recession at a time of great political uncertainty,” Ackman wrote in a Wednesday tweet.
![JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon hinted on Wednesday that he would consider a career in politics.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/05/NYPICHPDPICT000008070058.jpg?w=1024)
“There’s nothing more to realize at JPM. He’s already been crowned the best banker in the world,” continued Ackman.
“JPM’s stock will go up much more when he becomes POTUS because as president he can do more for the bank and our economy than as president and CEO of JPM.”
Previously, there had been speculation about Dimon’s potential presidential candidacy. At a 2018 conference, he reportedly joked about a hypothetical campaign against President Donald Trump.
“I feel I could beat Trump … because I’m as tough as him, I’m smarter than him,” he said. based on a CNN report.
Dimon added: “By the way, this wealthy Latest Yorker actually made his money. It wasn’t a present from Daddy.
Dimon later retracted these comments, saying the remark proved he wouldn’t be a very good politician.
Trump then responded to Dimon by calling him “a poor public speaker and a nervous mess.”
In 2019, Dimon told CNBC that he considers himself “barely a Democrat”.
He explained that “my heart is democratic, my brain is a bit republican.”
Dimon was asked by CNN in April if he still holds that view.
“I feel we are able to do a greater job of lifting all of our residents … Free market capitalism, properly regulated, has lifted billions of individuals out of poverty,” said Dimon.
“I normally follow my heart, but a part of my brain says if we will spend money, we must always spend it properly.”
Dimon was critical of Democrats on energy policy, saying “Republicans probably have it just a little higher.”
![Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman encouraged Dimon to run for president in 2024.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/05/NYPICHPDPICT000003817779-1.jpg?w=1024)
“If he decides to get out of banking, I feel he can be really good at politics,” former President Bill Clinton once said of Dimona.
A JPMorgan spokesperson didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
Dimon’s comments about his future got here as JPMorgan denied on Wednesday that its CEO had ever spoken to Jes Staley, a former top executive at the bank, about the lender’s business with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“There isn’t any evidence that such communication ever took place – nothing in the vast amount of documents reviewed and nothing in the nearly a dozen testimonies collected, including our own CEO,” the bank said in a press release.
The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Staley had communicated with Dimon on several occasions regarding the bank’s ties to Epstein, citing statements by the former director in legal documents that the newspaper had seen.
The bank was hit with two lawsuits in which it claimed it must have cut ties with Epstein.
He tries to carry Staley accountable for covering up what he knew about a disgraced financier.
With Postal Wires