Job creation was a major theme of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign — and he continues to not be shy about taking credit for positive job news.
The president-elect told reporters earlier this week that Sprint and OneWeb, a satellite manufacturer, will hire 8,000 people in the United States.
Sprint offered to bring jobs back to the U.S. because of “what is happening and the spirit and the hope” from his election, Trump said at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Pressed later on the claim, he insisted that “because of me they are doing 5,000 jobs in this country.”
He also announced that OneWeb, which is building a network of satellites to deliver high-speed internet access, would be hiring 3,000 people in the U.S.
But as Politico reports, the commitments by Sprint and OneWeb “are in line with hiring and investment pledges already made by their chief corporate benefactor, Japan-based SoftBank, whose top executive met with Trump earlier this month.”
A Sprint spokeswoman told Politico the 5,000 jobs the company is adding “are part of the 50,000 jobs that [SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son] previously announced [on Dec. 6]. It will be a combination of newly created jobs and bringing some existing jobs back to the U.S.”
The jobs will be created in areas including sales and customer care by the end of the fiscal year ending in March 2018.
OneWeb, meanwhile, said on Dec. 19 it would “create nearly 3,000 new engineering, manufacturing and supporting jobs in the U.S. over the next four years.” SoftBank is also an investor in OneWeb and is leading a $1.2 billion funding round for the startup.
Earlier this month, Trump announced a controversial deal to keep furnace manufacturer Carrier from outsourcing about 1,100 jobs to Mexico. But as USA Today reports, “details of the plan remain sketchy, sparking debate over how many Carrier jobs will actually be saved.”
