Manufacturer That Cut Jobs Deal With Trump Gets $2.5 Billion Pentagon Contract Without Competition
Aaron Gregg, Danielle Paquette, The Washington Post
United Technologies handed Donald Trump bragging rights in late 2016 when, just weeks after he won the election, the manufacturing giant publicly credited the soon-to-be president with striking a deal to save hundreds of Indiana furnace factory jobs that seemed destined to move to Mexico.
In exchange for $7 million in state tax credits, the firm agreed to retain 770 of roughly 1,400 positions at a Carrier plant in Indianapolis and send the rest to Monterrey, Mexico. Greg Hayes, the company’s chairman and chief executive, later suggested federal contracts also played a role, saying: “I was born at night, but not last night… . I also know that about 10 percent of our revenue comes from the U.S. government.”
More than a year into Trump’s presidency, that federal money continues to flow to United Technologies’ subsidiaries. The Defense Department recently gave the company’s Connecticut-based aeronautics subsidiary a $2.5 billion contract without competition to provide propeller systems, wheels and brakes, landing gear, flight sensors and other equipment directly to the armed services.
The contract applies to airplane parts for which the Defense Department considers United Technologies the only qualified supplier, effectively renewing an earlier 10-year contract set to expire in April. The award followed an earlier $2.74 billion sole-sourced Air Force contract handed to Pratt & Whitney, another United Technologies subsidiary.