JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon repeatedly warned about tariffs during President Trump's first term. He described it several times in 2018 as a threat to the economy, and said in 2019 that it was “not going to be a positive.”
Now in the second day of Trump's second term, Dimon said tariffs are a valuable “economic weapon.”
“If a little bit of inflation is good for national security, then that's fine,” Dimon told CNBC Wednesday at the World Economic Forum's annual conference in Davos, Switzerland. “Get over it,” he added.
Mr. Dimon did not say how he thought the tariffs would improve national security.
Mr. Dimon's endorsement is noteworthy because Mr. Dimon, the longtime head of JPMorgan, the nation's largest bank, has long been a critic of Mr. Trump. During his first term as president, Mr. Dimon once described himself as “smarter than he really is,” something the bank president later said he regretted. Dimon supported Kamala Harris during the presidential campaign.
But that was then. Mr. Dimon renewed his policy after Mr. Trump said he would impose 25% tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico and 10% on imports from China by next month. It seems that.
“The question is how they will be used,” he said Wednesday. “Can they be used to bring people to the table? Yes.”
A JPMorgan spokesperson said Mr. Dimon's views have not changed and that the issue is “not an either/or.”
