Trump slams union official over Carrier deal comments

After President-elect Donald Trump tweeted that Carrier’s union boss “has done a bad job”, the union leader began receiving threatening phone calls. Instead of rescuing all 1,350 Carrier jobs in question that the Washington Post reports Trump promised to save at a campaign rally in Indianapolis, Jones said Trump didn’t correctly count and address the jobs still moving to Mexico.

“Since last February, Chuck Jones has been on the front lines looking for every opportunity to stop 1,400 Hoosiers jobs from going to Mexico”. He got some spunk to him so it didn’t overly upset me. “Does it faze me? No”.

The threat that automation poses to jobs a big concern for Chuck Jones, president of United Steelworkers union Local 1999, which represents the Carrier workers.

Vice President-elect Governor Mike Pence greeets President-elect Donald Trump as he takes the stage to speak to workers at Carrier air conditioning and heating on December 1, 2016 in Indianapolis, Indiana.

According to Jones, Trump’s claim that he saved the jobs of “over 1,100 people” is flatly untrue, based on his interview with the Washington Post on Tuesday.

Jones had said following Trump’s announcement last week that the number of jobs saved is closer to 800.

“This guy makes pennies for what he does”, Brett Voorhies, the president of the Indiana State AFL-CIO, said of Jones.

“I took exception to that because our people, at that time, got their hopes back up that they might have a job”. The AP reported then that the figure covered about 800 union and supervisor jobs that were set for outsourcing to Mexico. “We know what vehicle you drive”.

In a second tweet, Trump suggested Jones should “Spend more time working – less time talking”, and said the union should “reduce dues”. And if you thought the President-elect was not going to tweet about Jones’ comments, think again.

Earlier in the week Mr Trump attacked Boeing, hours after its boss criticised his trade policy, but he denied a link.

He told MSNBC Thursday that after Trump’s tweets he immediately started receiving death threats, including from angry callers who demanded to know if he had children and warned him to watch out for his kids.

President-elect Trump: “I will tell you that united technologies and carrier stepped is it up and now they’re keeping actually the numbers over 1,100 people which is so great, which is so great”. But I began to get nervous when we couldn’t get any details on the deal. “And I’m not sorry about what I said”.

“He needs to worry about getting his Cabinet filled”, Jones said, “and leave me the hell alone”. Jones had criticized the deal by calling it “half-way delivered”.