-
Ken Griffin warned the new Trump administration against adopting extreme policies.
-
Speaking in New York on Thursday, Griffin praised the work of immigrants and warned against tax cuts.
-
He also expressed support for Apollo CEO Marc Rowan as finance minister.
Billionaire Citadel founder Ken Griffin is one of the Republican Party’s biggest donors but is concerned about the effect of the policies the Trump administration has promised.
Griffin said Thursday at the Economic Club of New York that while immigration and inflation were clearly the two biggest issues for voters this election, severe policy responses could hurt the country and the economy.
According to him, immigration to the US should still be open to people who want to come and work and be part of the American community. He argued that deporting all noncitizens would also increase inflation because Americans “take for granted” the work immigrants do every day.
“I’m not sure how this lunch would work” without this group of people, he said, adding, “It’s not feasible for us to deport everyone who is not a U.S. citizen and expect the economy to bounce back the next day.” work.”
Moreover, he said the world’s “best and brightest” should still be drawn to the US and argued that the country should make it easy for them to come and build businesses here. He said most of Citadel’s leadership team are immigrants and described Peng Zhao, the Chinese-born CEO of its market maker, Citadel Securities, as an example of “how fortunate our country has been.”
While Griffin has fought against tax increases in the past, including a $54 million campaign to defeat an Illinois tax initiative in 2020, he warned against tax cuts given the nation’s debt burden.
“I don’t think we have the fiscal space to reduce taxes from where they are now,” he said, arguing that some taxes might even need to be raised and that getting “America’s fiscal house in order” would lead politicians to take “really unpopular” positions.
Griffin is not the first Wall Street leader to push for a more moderate approach to immigration and tax policy. A few blocks away, Pimco CEO Manny Roman said Thursday morning that combining a tight labor market with an anti-immigration stance is worrisome because tax-paying, goods-consuming immigrants are good for growth and labor demand.
“You have to have a pro-immigration policy, and that’s the tension,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg’s Erik Schatzker at the Evident AI Symposium.
