The head of America’s largest bank called the possibility of another government shutdown “just bad management.”
“A democracy is a compromise by its nature. It's not a dictatorship. So anyone who says, ‘my way or the highway on one issue,’ isn't necessarily thinking about the United States of America,” JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said in an interview airing Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Conservative Republicans are threatening to force a government shutdown over federal funding of Planned Parenthood. Congress must pass some type of spending bill by the end of the month in order to avert the government coming to a halt. But several conservative members, outraged by videos produced by an anti-abortion rights group, say they will not vote for a bill that includes funding for Planned Parenthood. The organization runs clinics across the country that provide women’s health services, including abortions in some states.
Jamie Dimon, in some ways, is the embodiment of the Wall Street that many of the presidential candidates are running against and he understands why he's kind of their punching bag. "You know, we had a crisis. A lotta people got hurt. And the average American looks at what happened and they kinda blame Wall Street which I would-- it's generally true," the CEO said. But he said mistakes have been admitted and that his bank and others are part of the solution now.
As for backing someone in the 2016 election, Dimon demured, "I am not going to get involved in politics at this point." In the past, Dimon has donated to Hillary Clinton but he admitted that that he hasn't decided who he will back yet.
However, he did weigh in on whether he thought a CEO has the right attributes to be President of the United States. “I think a CEO has attributes that are important to have ... It's not sufficient though. I think you have a whole other set of attributes."