America’s Top Banker Holds Secret Talks with Frenemy Trump
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who Trump derided as a “highly overrated globalist,” has twice slipped into the White House.
Getty Images
Donald Trump quietly met with Jamie Dimon—the most powerful banker on Wall Street—at the White House, despite previously attacking him in public.
The JPMorgan Chase CEO made two trips to the White House over the past two months, according to the Wall Street Journal. Dimon is reported to have congratulated Trump on his Japanese trade deal before diving into affordable-housing shortages, post-crisis bank rules, and the Fed’s stubbornly high rates.
Trump and Dimon in 2017—Dimon later angered the MAGA leader by praising Nikki Haley as she ran against Trump for the 2024 Republican nomination.
Reuters
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick were also in attendance during an Oval Office meeting between Trump and Dimon last week, according to the Journal.
In June, the outlet reported, Trump and Vice President JD Vance welcomed Dimon at the White House.
The sit-downs mark a startling thaw, with the pair of frenemies not having had “a substantive conversation for years,” according to the Journal.
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Not only that, but they appeared to have a mutual distaste for one another.
In November 2023, Trump erupted on Truth Social after Dimon urged business leaders to back Nikki Haley in the Republican primary. Trump accused Dimon of being a “Highly overrated Globalist.”
“I’ve never been a big Jamie Dimon fan, but had to live with this guy when he came begging to the White House,” Trump fumed at the time. “I guess I don’t have to live with him anymore, and that’s a really good thing!”
Trump publicly attacked Dimon before saying he would consider making him his Treasury secretary.
Yuri Gripas/Reuters/Corbis
Trump later told Bloomberg he would consider making Dimon his Treasury secretary, only to confirm in November that Dimon would not be invited to join his Cabinet.
But Dimon has lobbed plenty of grenades of his own. When Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs rattled markets this spring, the banker warned on Fox Business they were “way beyond what people expected” and made a recession “likely.”
People briefed on last week’s meeting quoted by the Journal say Dimon assured Trump that strong growth—rather than political meddling—would naturally pull interest rates down, echoing the argument Treasury officials used to dissuade the president from firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
Trump, for his part, cited the JPMorgan CEO’s recession warnings in April when he delayed another round of tariffs.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
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