On the second day of the federal shutdown, more than a dozen Wall Street bank chiefs met with President Obama at the White House and urged him to find resolution to the shutdown.
J.P. Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said he “would love to see a resolution” to the government shutdown, while walking into the White House before the meeting.
When asked if the president should make a deal with Republicans, Dimon said: “I’m not a politician.”
The 14 bank chiefs included Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, Brian Moynihan of Bank of America, James Gorman of Morgan Stanley, Robert Benmosche of American International Group, Michael Corbat of Citigroup, John Stumpf of Wells Fargo, Gerald Hassell of Bank of New York Mellon, Anshu Jain, of Deutsche Bank, among others.
Congress has been unable to come to a deal to fund the federal government, which shut down on Tuesday. Even more pressing to bank chiefs and investors, Congress has until Oct. 17 before the Treasury exceeds its borrowing capacity, which means the U.S. will no longer be able to pay all its bills in full.
The White House meeting was originally organized as part of the Obama Administration’s efforts to mend relations with the financial services sector and woo their support for White House policy.
Many of the institutions are still resolving investigations by various government agencies on questionable mortgages and financing in the early to mid-2000s, which led to the real estate bubble and ultimately the financial crisis.
Just last week, Dimon was in Washington to meet with Attorney General Eric Holder about settling government investigations related to mortgage-backed securities.
Wells Fargo was sued on Wednesday by New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman for violating last year’s National Mortgage Settlement.
The CEO visit was organized by the Financial Services Forum, a trade group which represents bank chiefs. Blankfein is currently the forum’s rotating chairman.
— CNN’s Kevin Liptak contributed to this report.
