Jamie Dimon’s Davos rant shows ICE pressure is huge test for corporate America — and the media

What was up with Jamie Dimon at Davos – talking about “five grown men beating up little women”?

On further inspection, his edgy asides about the ICE controversy in Minneapolis were more nuanced than what the headlines blared – and it might help to read them in full.

At the most tumultuous and memorable World Economic Forum event in years, which included President Trump’s whiplash-inducing pivot on Greenland, it was a few scattered comments from the CEO of JPMorgan Chase that sent Wall Street into a tizzy.

Dimon, as we all know, can be provocative. But for those following immigration enforcement, including the tragic mess that is Minneapolis, Dimon’s “little women” soundbite smacked of a cheap shot from some lefty pol, a tough yet questionable account of the facts on the ground. 

Indeed, On The Money was prepared to tell Dimon maybe he should focus on running his company, and stay away from politics.

Nevertheless, based on a fair reading of Dimon’s full remarks, there’s some truth in what he told his interlocutor that afternoon – and a warning that the mainstream media can’t be trusted entirely to provide a fair accounting of the situation.

First, Dimon’s handlers concede that he probably didn’t literally see “five grown men beating up little women” as he stated in that eye-popping rejoinder. His remarks were a “generalization” based on his perception of what he’s seeing daily on television and reading in the paper. 

Dimon believes the immigration mess, the millions of illegals that poured into this country under former President Joe Biden, was among the biggest public policy mistakes in years; he credits President Trump for shutting down the border.

He is also disturbed, as many Americans are, of the images of agents from Immigration Customs and Enforcement forcefully cracking down on protesters and even targets of their raids. He would like them to “be respectful,” maybe refrain from violent confrontations that have left two protesters dead in that city.

But, and this is a big but, he isn’t sure what he is seeing – the accounts of the ICE crackdown or what he’s reading in the “liberal” mainstream media — tells the whole story.

“I’m a fanatic about detail. Show me who’s been rounded up,” he said later in the interview, which wasn’t so widely reported. “Are they here legally? Are they criminals? Did they do something … Did they break American law? … I don’t like what I’m seeing. But it’s hard for me to tell whether that’s just, you know, (what) the liberal press plays or whether there’s more truth to that.”

Good point, Jamie. It’s no secret that the “liberal press” would love to enlist you and the rest of the CEO class and join the fight against the Trump immigration crackdown; just witness a recent New York Times Dealbook piece calling on the C-suite to speak out against ICE.

A few, like Apple’s Tim Cook and Sam Altman of OpenAI, have gone there, telling their employees that the crackdown is too extreme. Many more, Dimon included, I am told by their handlers, are largely sitting this out because they know what’s happening in Minneapolis isn’t a MLK-like peaceful protest. 

They’ve also learned from experience, the last time they took the bait from progressive movement and joined the fight against faux injustice occurred back in 2020 in the aftermath of George Floyd. Floyd’s death was tragic, but he was no saint, even if the CEO class treated him as one while likening America of 2020 to Mississippi of the early 1960s. 

What followed next was not just virtue signaling, but unnecessary and counterproductive changes of corporate policy: Loans directed to people based on race, sensitivity sessions featuring left-wing radicals preaching cultural Marxism, and destructive and illegal hiring policies known as DEI.

America’s CEO class has been busy correcting this overreach ever since, dismantling DEI policies and remaining largely apolitical when it comes to the Trump agenda, and his MAGA leanings.

What’s going on in Minneapolis is a test, of course, for further CEO common sense. These guys and a few gals carry a lot of weight in any public debate or obvious reasons. People have tragically died while Trump has lived up to his campaign promise on immigration so the temptation to speak out is obvious, particularly when you read that Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, was killed for simply protesting ICE agents arresting grandmothers who overstayed their visas.

But the facts – the ones that Dimon worries are being shaded by a liberal press corps – provide a more complicated account of the matter and Pretti’s involvement in a violent, organized assault on federal agents who aren’t focusing on grandmothers, but rapists and murderers that Biden let in through our front door.

It’s an organized resistance effort funded by God knows what leftist organization; it’s being stoked by some of the most reckless politicians in the country, all with their own considerable baggage. People like Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who likened ICE to the Nazis for ridding his streets of people breaking the law.

Yes Trump and ICE can do better, as Dimon rightfully pointed out, but also as he suggested, so could the media in unpacking this complicated and tragic story.