Jamie Dimon Stays Atop Business Roundtable to Influence Trump Agenda

(Bloomberg) -- JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon was elected chairman of the Business Roundtable for a third year as the lobbying group looks to influence policy in the second half of U.S. President Donald Trump’s term.

• The Washington-based group, which announced Dimon’s re-election in a statement Thursday, represents some 200 CEOs at companies from AT&T Inc. to General Motors Co.

Key Insights

• Dimon, 62, will lead efforts to navigate a divide between the CEOs and Trump’s tariff-first approach to trade, his anti-immigration rhetoric and his displeasure with GM over plans to close U.S. factories and lay off thousands of workers.
• Under Dimon, the Roundtable has sought more influence in Washington, and it pushed hard for Trump’s package of tax reductions. The group set a record for its spending in the final quarter of 2017 as Congress passed the cuts.
• The JPMorgan chief helped the lobbying group unite after its CEOs clashed over issues including a proposed import tax. When he took the chairman’s job in January 2017, Dimon told Bloomberg that his first message to the members was to get past their “parochial interests” and pull together.
• His high profile has a price: Dimon’s public appearances tend to draw vocal protesters who think his bank, one of the world’s richest, should be more active in social and political issues.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ben Brody in Washington at btenerellabr@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net, Dan Reichl, Michael J. Moore

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