Opinion | Why Wall Street is trying to shake up the 2024 race – By Gillian Tett (The Fiscal Times) / June 1, 2023
American investors fear a Biden-Trump rematch, but history may beat chatter when it comes to a third-party candidate
When Jamie Dimon, head of JPMorgan, flew to Shanghai this week, he might have expected to attract attention for his views on Sino-American relations. But that was before Bill Ackman, the veteran activist investor, jumped in. On Wednesday, Ackman issued a passionate appeal for Dimon to throw his hat into the 2024 presidential race, challenging the incumbent Joe Biden on a Democrat ticket.
“Our country is at risk with $32tn of debt with no end to massive deficits in sight, heading into a recession at a time of great political uncertainty,” Ackman tweeted, lamenting that “@POTUS [ie Biden] is extremely weak and in cognitive decline [and] 70 per cent of Democrats don’t want him to run”. Ouch.
“Jamie just needs a push from people he respects and from the broader electorate” to run, Ackman continued, lauding him as the “centrist” to beat both Biden and Donald Trump. The former president is currently favoured as the Republican presidential candidate by 56 per cent of Republican-leaning voters, according to a recent Quinnipiac poll.
Should Dimon as potential POTUS be taken seriously? It seems hard. Ackman tells me he did not tell Dimon in advance about the tweet. But Dimon’s friends say he has been mulling the presidency idea for some time; indeed, he had already observed in Shanghai that “maybe one day I’ll serve my country in one capacity or another”. Moreover, he has not shot down the suggestion in public — yet.
