In the might-equals-right world of Republicans, Donald Trump’s unpresidential attack on a union head who called out his lies about Carrier manufacturing jobs was to be defended the Trump-GOP way: with more lies and smears. Fox host Bill Hemmer provided the friendly platform for the hate-mongering propaganda.
In case you missed it, today's Washington Post explains President-elect Trump’s latest Twitter temper tantrum:
Chuck Jones, the president of the local chapter of the United Steelworkers union that represents Carrier employees in Indianapolis, told The Post the day before yesterday that the president-elect exaggerated the number of jobs he’d saved. It turns out that 550 of his members will lose their livelihoods, after all, because Trump was taking credit for keeping 350 engineering positions in the United States that were never going to leave. Yet the company will still collect millions in lucrative tax breaks.
The Post goes on to note that 20 minutes after appearing on CNN to discuss the matter, Trump began attacking Jones:
Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers. No wonder companies flee country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 8, 2016
If United Steelworkers 1999 was any good, they would have kept those jobs in Indiana. Spend more time working-less time talking. Reduce dues
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 8, 2016
Not long after that, The Post reported, Jones began to receive threatening phone calls.
Trump’s attack also spawned a big Twitter backlash via the hashtag #ImWithChuck.
But hey, it’s a union head and a Republican president-elect. Why should Republican National Committee's Chief Strategist and Communications Director Sean Spicer care about truth or decency?
Spicer fought back the Trump way: with more lies and smears. And Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer was there to facilitate.
Hemmer opened the discussion about Trump’s “Twitter spat” by asking, “What does Mr. Trump want out of that?” Then Hemmer listened without a word of challenge to Spicer’s Orwellian response. He deceptively painted Jones as the “fabricator” and Trump the champion for the little guy.
SPICER: He wants the truth. I mean, here you have a guy that talked about Carrier and the importance of keeping the jobs. He picks up the phone, he closes the deal, you’ve got a thousand people that are going to have a blessed holiday season, that are not worried about jobs, that get to spend this time with their family and friends, knowing that they have a job with good benefits. That should be something that’s celebrated.
And then you’ve got a union boss that goes out and fabricates how the story went down for no reason. He should be grateful for Mr. Trump and Governor Pence’s efforts to help save those jobs. Instead, the guy whose job it was to actually be advocating on behalf, picks a fight with the president-elect who went out of his way to advocate and fight for a thousand people’s jobs so that they could live next year and the years after it, knowing that they’ve got a good paying job with good benefits. I think Mr. Trump is never going to sit back and let someone take a shot falsely at him without responding.
In case your BS detector has not already gone into overload, it turns out that Carrier has every intention of getting rid of more jobs via automation. Business Insider caught the CEO of Carrier’s parent company, United Technologies, Greg Hayes, inadvertently revealing the truth: The company plans to make a $16 million investment in automation at its Indiana factory (probably with much thanks to the publicly-funded tax credits Trump negotiated) and, as Hayes told CNBC, “But what that ultimately means is there will be fewer jobs.” (H/T Randi Rhodes)
Hemmer did not challenge one word of Spicer’s baloney.
Watch the propaganda below, from the December 8, 2016 America’s Newsroom. Also below is a Washington Post fact check video that corroborates Jones.
If you’d like to tweet any of these folks, you can contact them at @realDonaldTrump, @seanspicer, @BillHemmer, @AmericaNewsroom and @FoxNews.
The mind boggles.