WASHINGTON — The union president slammed by Donald Trump on Twitter challenged the president-elect today to back up his claim that a deal to discourage Carrier Corp. from closing an Indiana factory would save 1,100 American jobs.

"He overreacted, President-elect Trump did," United Steelworkers 1999 President Alex Jones told CNN. "He should have come out and tried to justify his numbers."

Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence — governor of Indiana — visited Carrier's Indianapolis factory Dec. 1 to celebrate the deal. Trump suggested then that the number of jobs saved could top 1,100. Jones says the total is much less because more than 400 jobs will still be lost from the Indianapolis plant.

"A lot of the people thought at that time thought that they were going to have a job" who might not, Jones said Thursday.

Late Wednesday, Trump tweeted: "Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers."

In a second tweet, Trump suggested Jones should "Spend more time working — less time talking" and the union should "Reduce dues."

About 30 minutes after Trump tweeted about Jones, the union leader started getting harassing phone calls, he told MSNBC.

He said one caller asked: "What kind of car do you drive?" Another said: "We're coming for you."

He told the cable news outlet he wasn't sure how the callers found his number.

"Nothing that says they're going to kill me, but, you know, you better keep your eye on your kids," Jones told MSNBC. "I've been doing this job for 30 years, and I've heard everything from people who want to burn my house down or shoot me ... I can deal with people that make stupid statements and move on."</s>'s itchy Twitter finger aimed at a new target yesterday:, president of, which represents workers at theplant in Indianapolis.Trump, along with Indiana Gov. and Vice-President elect, was involved in a deal with Carrier that gave them $7 million in state tax credits to reduce the number of jobs they were offshoring to Mexico. That was excellent news for the 800 Carrier workers who got to keep their jobs (730 union steelworkers and 70 non-union workers in clerical and management positions). But Jones argued that Trump had oversold the win by inaccurately claiming that he had saved more than 1,100 jobs.“For whatever reason, he lied his ass off," Jones told the Washington Post . “Trump and Pence, they pulled a dog and pony show on the numbers. I almost threw up in my mouth.”Jones said that he was thankful for the jobs that were kept, but that Trump had come up short on his promise to keep 1,400 Carrier jobs from moving to Mexico. In fact, even after the deal and the state tax credits, the company is still shipping offshoring nearly 600 jobs (including 550 union steelworker jobs). "You made a promise to keep all these jobs," Jones told CNN . "You half-way delivered. We expect you go back and keep all the jobs." Meanwhile, Jones noted, Carrier is also offshoring 700 jobs from a separate facility in Huntington, Indiana."He's lying his ass off," Jones said. "That's not just my feeling. The numbers prove he's lying his ass off. It's a damn shame when you come in and make a false statements like that. If you're dealing with people's livelihoods, you sure ought to know what the numbers are."Trump responded with the tweets above. It seems like a poor choice for the president elect of the United States to insult a local union and a local union rep, but Trump marches to the beat of a different dumb.After Trump's tweets, Jones started receiving death threats , but said that he'd been doing union work for decades and was used to threats.The national United Steelworkers union responded that Jones was "a hero, not a scapegoat" who had "worked tirelessly since day one to save ALL jobs there" and noted that Trump and other national leaders only became aware of the Carrier situation because of Jones' advocacy.</s>'s itchy Twitter finger aimed at a new target yesterday:, president of, which represents workers at theplant in Indianapolis.Trump, along with Indiana Gov. and Vice-President elect, was involved in a deal with Carrier that gave them $7 million in state tax credits to reduce the number of jobs they were offshoring to Mexico. That was excellent news for the 800 Carrier workers who got to keep their jobs (730 union steelworkers and 70 non-union workers in clerical and management positions). But Jones argued that Trump had oversold the win by inaccurately claiming that he had saved more than 1,100 jobs.“For whatever reason, he lied his ass off," Jones told the Washington Post . “Trump and Pence, they pulled a dog and pony show on the numbers. I almost threw up in my mouth.”Jones said that he was thankful for the jobs that were kept, but that Trump had come up short on his promise to keep 1,400 Carrier jobs from moving to Mexico. In fact, even after the deal and the state tax credits, the company is still shipping offshoring nearly 600 jobs (including 550 union steelworker jobs). "You made a promise to keep all these jobs," Jones told CNN . "You half-way delivered. We expect you go back and keep all the jobs." Meanwhile, Jones noted, Carrier is also offshoring 700 jobs from a separate facility in Huntington, Indiana."He's lying his ass off," Jones said. "That's not just my feeling. The numbers prove he's lying his ass off. It's a damn shame when you come in and make a false statements like that. If you're dealing with people's livelihoods, you sure ought to know what the numbers are."Trump responded with the tweets above. It seems like a poor choice for the president elect of the United States to insult a local union and a local union rep, but Trump marches to the beat of a different dumb.After Trump's tweets, Jones started receiving death threats , but said that he'd been doing union work for decades and was used to threats.The national United Steelworkers union responded that Jones was "a hero, not a scapegoat" who had "worked tirelessly since day one to save ALL jobs there" and noted that Trump and other national leaders only became aware of the Carrier situation because of Jones' advocacy.</s>WASHINGTON — The union president slammed by Donald Trump on Twitter challenged the president-elect Thursday to back up his claim that a deal to discourage Carrier Corp. from closing an Indiana factory would save 1,100 American jobs.

"He overreacted, President-elect Trump did," United Steelworkers 1999 President Chuck Jones told CNN. "He should have come out and tried to justify his numbers."

Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence — governor of Indiana — visited Carrier's Indianapolis factory Dec. 1 to celebrate the deal. Trump suggested then that the number of jobs saved could top 1,100. Jones says the total is much less because more than 400 jobs will still be lost from the Indianapolis plant.

"A lot of the people thought at that time thought that they were going to have a job" who might not, Jones said Thursday.

Late Wednesday, Trump tweeted: "Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers."

[INTERACTIVE: Donald Trump timeline + guide to all appointments made so far]

In a second tweet, Trump suggested Jones should "Spend more time working — less time talking" and the union should "Reduce dues."

About 30 minutes after Trump tweeted about Jones, the union leader started getting harassing phone calls, he told MSNBC.

He said one caller asked: "What kind of car do you drive?" Another said: "We're coming for you."

He told the cable news outlet he wasn't sure how the callers found his number.

"Nothing that says they're going to kill me, but, you know, you better keep your eye on your kids," Jones told MSNBC. "I've been doing this job for 30 years, and I've heard everything from people who want to burn my house down or shoot me ... I can deal with people that make stupid statements and move on."</s>The Secret Service agents told the Carrier workers to stay put, so Chuck Jones sat in the factory conference room for nearly three hours, waiting for president-elect Donald Trump. He’d grown used to this suspense.

Seven months earlier, at a campaign rally in Indianapolis, Trump had pledged to save the plant’s jobs, most of which were slated to move to Mexico. Then the businessman won the election, and the 1,350 workers whose paychecks were on the line wondered if he’d keep his promise.

Jones, president of the United Steelworkers 1999, which represents Carrier employees, felt optimistic when Trump announced last week that he’d reached a deal with the factory’s parent company, United Technologies, to preserve 1,100 of the Indianapolis jobs — until the union leader heard from Carrier that only 730 of the production jobs would stay and 550 of his members would lose their livelihoods, after all.

At the Dec. 1 meeting, where Trump was supposed to lay out the details, Jones hoped he would explain himself.

“But he got up there,” Jones said Tuesday, “and, for whatever reason, lied his a-- off.”

In front of a crowd of about 150 supervisors, production workers and reporters, Trump praised Carrier and its parent company, United Technologies. "Now they’re keeping — actually the number’s over 1,100 people,” he said, “which is so great.”

Jones wondered why the president-elect appeared to be inflating the victory. Trump and Pence, he said, could take credit for rescuing 800 of the Carrier jobs, including non-union positions.

Of the nearly 1,400 workers at the Indianapolis plant, however, 350 in research and development were never scheduled to leave, Jones said. Another 80 jobs, which Trump seemed to include in his figure, were non-union clerical and supervisory positions. (A Carrier spokesperson confirmed the numbers.) And now the president-elect was applauding the company and giving it millions of dollars in tax breaks, even as hundreds of Indianapolis workers prepared to be laid off.

“Trump and Pence, they pulled a dog and pony show on the numbers,” said Jones, who voted for Hillary Clinton but called her "the better of two evils." “I almost threw up in my mouth.”

Spokespeople for Trump did not respond to the Post’s request for comment.

In exchange for downsizing its move south of the border, United Technologies would receive $7 million in tax credits from Indiana, to be paid in $700,000 installments each year for a decade. Carrier, meanwhile, agreed to invest $16 million in its Indiana operation. United Technologies still plans to send 700 factory jobs from Huntington, Ind, to Monterrey, Mexico.

T.J. Bray, 32, one of the workers who will keep his job, sat in the front row during the Dec. 1 meeting as Trump spoke. A corporate employee had guided him specifically to that seat, he said, so he suspected he might be part of Trump’s remarks.

On Carrier's makeshift stage, Trump paraphrased the words of an unnamed Carrier employee who talked to an NBC reporter after the election. Bray was the only Carrier employee who had appeared on television that day. Apparently, he realized, Trump was saying he inspired the deal.

“He said something to the effect, ‘No, we’re not leaving, because Donald Trump promised us that we’re not leaving,’ and I never thought I made that promise,” Trump said. “Not with Carrier. I made it for everybody else. I didn’t make it really for Carrier.”

In fact, Trump did make that commitment, and it's on video. "They're going to call me and they are going to say 'Mr. President, Carrier has decided to stay in Indiana,'” Trump had said at the April rally. "One hundred percent -- that's what is going to happen."

Last week, though, the president-elect told the Carrier crowd he hadn't meant that literally.

“I was talking about Carrier like all other companies from here on in," Trump said. "Because they made the decision a year and a half ago. But he believed that was — and I could understand it. I actually said — I didn’t make it — when they played that, I said, 'I did make it, but I didn’t mean it quite that way.'”

Trump asked if the employee he’d been referencing was in the audience. A woman yelled that her son was, and Trump began to compliment that son, though he hadn't spoken in the television news segment. (Bray said that a United Technologies spokesperson later told him Trump meant to single him out.)

“I was confused when he was like, ‘I wasn’t talking about Carrier,’” Bray said. “You made this whole campaign about Carrier, and we're still losing a lot of jobs.”

Bray clapped that day, anyway, for the 800 that would remain on American soil.

More on Wonkblog:

After Trump pledged to keep Carrier jobs in U.S., company says it won’t move nearly 1,000 to Mexico

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Why Trump would struggle to punish companies that offshore jobs</s>WASHINGTON (AP) — The union president slammed by Donald Trump on Twitter challenged the president-elect today to back up his claim that a deal to discourage Carrier Corp. from closing an Indiana factory would save 1,100 American jobs.

"He overreacted, President-elect Trump did," United Steelworkers 1999 President Chuck Jones told CNN. "He should have come out and tried to justify his numbers."

Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence – governor of Indiana – visited Carrier's Indianapolis factory Dec. 1 to celebrate the deal. Trump suggested then that the number of jobs saved could top 1,100. Jones says the total is much less because more than 400 jobs will still be lost from the Indianapolis plant.

"A lot of the people thought at that time thought that they were going to have a job" who might not, Jones said today.

Late Wednesday, Trump tweeted: "Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers."

In a second tweet, Trump suggested Jones should "Spend more time working – less time talking" and the union should "Reduce dues."

About 30 minutes after Trump tweeted about Jones, the union leader started getting harassing phone calls, he told MSNBC.

He said one caller asked: "What kind of car do you drive?" Another said: "We're coming for you."

He told the cable news outlet he wasn't sure how the callers found his number.</s>WASHINGTON — The union president slammed by Donald Trump on Twitter challenged the president-elect Thursday to back up his claim that a deal to discourage Carrier Corp. from closing an Indiana factory would save 1,100 American jobs.

"He overreacted, President-elect Trump did," United Steelworkers Local 1999 President Chuck Jones told CNN. "He should have come out and tried to justify his numbers."

Trump and Mike Pence — governor of Indiana — visited Carrier's Indianapolis factory Dec. 1 to celebrate the deal. Trump suggested then that the number of jobs saved could top 1,100.

Jones said following Trump's announcement that the number of jobs saved is more like 800. "Are we pleased with some of the jobs being saved?" Jones told The Associated Press. "Yeah, without a doubt. But Trump is saying no more jobs are going to be leaving this country, and I think we could use a little more honesty."

Indiana officials said Dec. 1 the deal involved "preserving 1,069 high-wage jobs" as Carrier kept furnace manufacturing at the plant and received $7 million in tax incentives over 10 years. The AP reported the figure covered about 800 union and supervisor jobs that were set for outsourcing to Mexico — and included some 250 headquarters and engineering staff positions which the company had always said would remain in Indianapolis.

In a second tweet Wednesday night, Trump suggested to Jones: "Spend more time working — less time talking" and the union should "Reduce dues."

He said one caller asked: "What kind of car do you drive?" Another said: "We're coming for you."

He told the cable news outlet he wasn't sure how the callers found his number.

"Nothing that says they're going to kill me, but, you know, you better keep your eye on your kids," Jones told MSNBC. "I've been doing this job for 30 years, and I've heard everything from people who want to burn my house down or shoot me ... I can deal with people that make stupid statements and move on."

This story has been changed to correct Jones' first name to Chuck.</s>President-elect Donald Trump lashed out Wednesday at a union leader who has criticized Trump's Carrier job deal as a promise "half-way delivered."

Chuck Jones, president of United Steelworkers Local 1999, has been critical of Trump's claim to have saved 1,100 jobs at the Indianapolis plant since Tuesday.

But shortly after Jones appeared on CNN's "Erin Burnett Out Front" program Wednesday night, the president-elect appeared to blame union leaders like him for companies leaving the U.S.

"Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers. No wonder companies flee country!" Trump wrote.

He followed up with another attack just over an hour later: "If United Steelworkers 1999 was any good, they would have kept those jobs in Indiana."

Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who is also the governor of Indiana, gave a very different description of the union back in March. He tweeted a photo of a meeting he had about Carrier with Jones and Local 1999 members, calling them "hardworking."

Jones has complained that Trump has fallen short of his campaign promise to keep Carrier from moving 1,400 jobs to Mexico.

"You made a promise to keep all these jobs. You half-way delivered," Jones told CNNMoney in an interview earlier Wednesday. "We expect you go back and keep all the jobs."

Jones added that Trump should also help the 350 workers at an Indianapolis plant owned by another company, Rexnord, which is also slated to move to Mexico. Workers there are also members of USW Local 1999.

Related: How Donald Trump got Carrier to stay

"Trump said no companies would be allowed to go to Mexico," Jones said. "There are more than 300 people over there at Rexnord. He needs to deliver for them as well."

Jones did not get to speak with Trump when the President-elect visited Carrier last week. But he said he was angry when Trump praised Carrier for "keeping 1,100 people" in jobs that won't move to Mexico. The real number is 800.

To get the higher number, Carrier and Trump are counting 300 administrative and engineering jobs at a different facility in Indianapolis that were never at risk of being shipped to Mexico.

Related: Trump says he'll punish companies for leaving U.S.

Carrier is still shifting about 600 jobs building fan coils to Mexico sometime next year. Under the deal with Trump, Carrier only agreed to keep the part of the plant that builds furnaces open, saving the 800 jobs in Indianapolis.

Carrier confirmed to CNNMoney on Friday that it never planned to move the 300 administrative and engineering positions.

"He's lying his a-- off," Jones said about Trump's claim of saving 1,100 jobs. "That's not just my feeling. The numbers prove he's lying his a-- off. It's a damn shame when you come in and make a false statements like that."

Later Wednesday Jones elaborated in an interview with Erin Burnett.

Jones said many of the workers whose jobs may now be saved are grateful to Trump, but that some workers who are still worried about losing their jobs are angry.

"We have a lot of our members, when word was coming out... they thought they would have a job. Then they found out Friday, that most likely they weren't," he said.

Burnett asked if Jones thought Trump should apologize, and he said, "I think he ought to make sure he gets all the facts straight before he starts talking about what he's done."

"I'm extremely grateful for what he did. There's 800 people who have jobs... It's not all one sided. I just wished it had been handled in more of a professional matter."

The Trump transition team did not respond to a request for comment about the jobs still moving to Mexico.

Related: 1,000 jobs saved by Trump. Thousands more to go

Jones said he hopes the company will offer workers the chance to leave voluntarily with the severance package that was previously negotiated -- one week of pay for every year of service.

Ideally, more senior workers at the plant would take the package and retire, which would save the jobs of younger workers. The plant has a large number of senior employees.

"For workers who have 40 years in and were getting close to retirement, that 40 weeks pay might look pretty good," Jones said. But severance talks have yet to start.
Union leader Chuck Jones criticizes Donald Trump's announcement of kept jobs saying that the numbers mentioned are lower. Jones says that 550 workers would actually lose their livelihoods, while other workers were never scheduled to leave.