Trump, Pai Falsely Take Credit for Year-Old Charter Job Plans

President Trump today met with Charter CEO Tom Rutledge, where both put on a bit of a show -- implying that the President's policies were responsible for the creation of 20,000 jobs and $25 billion in investment at the cable giant. At the press event held at the White House Oval Office, Rutledge and Trump were joined by Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Energy Secretary Rick Perry, where the opening of a opening of a South Texas call center by Charter was the centerpiece of the show.

"We're embracing a new economic model -- the American model," proclaimed Trump at the event. "We're going to massively eliminate job-killing regulations. That has started already, big league. Reduce government burdens and lower taxes that are crushing American business and workers all over this country."

FCC boss Ajit Pai also quickly released a statement trying to claim his policies were to thank for Charter's announcement.

"I’m pleased to see that our investment-friendly policies, along with the Administration’s overall regulatory approach, are already producing results," said Pai.

The problem? Charter's plan to create 20,000 jobs by closing overseas call centers was actually originally announced in February of 2016 -- as part of the company's sales pitch for the Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks megamerger.

And as some reporters were quick to point out on Twitter, the $25 billion -- to be spent over four years -- is actually a bit less than what Charter's standard operating CAPEX has been historically. In fact, a 2015 Charter SEC filing (page 221) indicates this $25 million is well in line with what they'd always expected to spend.

"I’m pleased to see that our investment-friendly policies, along with the Administration’s overall regulatory approach, are already producing results," said Pai.

-FCC boss Ajit Pai

In other words: none of this is new, and none of it has anything to do with Donald Trump or Ajit Pai.

Regardless, Charter was happy to play up the suggestion that Trump's telecom policy (which yesterday culminated in the killing of consumer privacy protections by lawmakers soaked by AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Charter campaign contributions) was the reason for Charter's employment plans, transparently hopeful this would curry favor with the administration.

"With confidence in the deregulatory policies of the Administration and the FCC, Charter is planning to invest $25 billion in broadband infrastructure and technology in the next four years," Charter said in its own statement. "In addition, we are committed to moving all of the former Time Warner Cable customer service calls from offshore to the United States, consistent with our approach at Charter, and will create new jobs to handle those calls."

Rutledge has previously hinted that he'd be very happy if the Trump administration reversed the FCC's Title II classification decision, which would by proxy erode the agency's consumer protection authority -- and the nation's net neutrality rules.

“Sure, we had a lot of headwinds in the previous administration from a regulatory point of view, but it didn’t really affect us," Rutledge said during Charter’s fourth-quarter earnings call. "And I think that there is a good probability all that could be reversed, which would be a good thing for us."

Taking credit for job creation plans Trump had nothing to do with has become a sort of tradition in the first few months of the Trump Presidency. Sprint owner Softbank previously let the Trump administration claim credit for already-announced plans to move some of its own support technicans back to the States in the wake of defecting wireless subscribers, despite the fact those plans were also cemented well before Trump was even elected. Sprint is hoping to take another swing at acquiring T-Mobile, after its first attempt was nixed by regulators for being a competition and job killer.

In Charter and Rutledge's case, the company may be trying to butter up the administration to specifically gain approval of either an acquisition of T-Mobile, or a rumored M&A with Verizon Communications . Trump consistently lambasted such consolidation on the election trail, insisting he'd not only block AT&T's acquisition of Time Warner, but break up the already merged Comcast NBC Universal. But here in the real world, Charter customers are still reeling from Charter's last megamerger, which so far has resulted in higher rates, frozen broadband upgrades, and even worse customer service than ever.