J.P. Morgan (JPM) Chase CEO Jamie Dimon wants to mount a presidential campaign.
But he won’t do it, the Wall Street executive said in an interview with the Carlyle Group’s co-founder, David Rubenstein during a Monday lunch at the Economic Club in Washington D.C.
“I would love to be president of the United States of America,” Dimon said when asked if he’d ever consider running for office. “Until Donald Trump got to where he was, I used to say you’ll never have a rich businessman who’s never been in politics be president. I was clearly wrong about that.”
“I just think it’s too hard and too late,” the self-described Democrat continued.
J.P. Morgan (JPM) executive noted that most people who run for office have had a lengthy career in politics. He has previously mentioned that being a CEO isn’t enough experience to run a country. Politics requires years of practice, and an entire set of skills unfamiliar to chief executives.
That said, if Dimon had run for president, his campaign would likely be projecting the antithesis of Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump’s message. While Trump’s slogan is “make America great again,” Dimon told Rubenstein that the country has the “best hand dealt of any country on this planet today, ever.”
According to Dimon, the U.S. Has “peaceful, wonderful neighbors” in Canada and Mexico, citizens have all the food, energy, and water they would ever need, while the country has the best military, and will continue to as long as the U.S. Economy—which is doing just fine—keeps up.
“It’s extraordinary,” he said. “We have it all, and we just need to fix it.”
Dimon noted he’d like to see more income tax credit, which would lessen the tax burden on the lower working class, with higher tax rates on carried interest, which would force general partner of a private investment fund to pay more taxes (“You can afford it, David,” Dimon quipped at Rubenstein).
He has also voiced support in the past for legalizing undocumented immigrants in the U.S., reforming intercity schools, higher infrastructure spending, higher minimum wages, and lower corporate taxes.
And unlike both democratic presidential candidate Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the executive seems to believe in the Trans Pacific Partnership, saying it would be positive for GDP and wages.
