South Korean workers detained during a massive immigration raid on a Hyundai facility[1] in Georgia will be returned to South Korea on a chartered flight, President Lee Jae-myung’s office said Sunday.
Federal and immigration agents arrested 475 people on Thursday — mostly South Korean nationals[2] — while executing a judicial search warrant as part of a criminal investigation into alleged unlawful employment at the facility.
“Negotiations for the release of the detained workers have been concluded,” a presidential spokesperson announced Sunday. “Once the procedures are complete, the chartered plane will depart to bring our citizens.”
The spokesperson added that South Korea will “push forward measures to review and improve the residency status and visa system for personnel travelling to the United States.”
The incident had strained ties with South Korea, the world’s 10th-largest economy and the key U.S. ally.
U.S. officials were not immediately available for comment.
The U.S. raid, part of the Trump administration’s escalating crackdown on immigrants[3], was the largest single-site enforcement operation in the history of the Department of Homeland Security.
A sea of agents from HSI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies showed up Thursday to the site in the town of Ellabell where Hyundai and LG Energy Solution, a battery company based in Seoul, are jointly building a plant next to the manufacturing facility for electric vehicles.
LG Energy Solution said Saturday that 47 of its employees were detained, 46 of them Korean. Another 250 personnel from “equipment partner companies,” most of them Korean, were also being held, it added.
The raid came just 11 days after a summit between Trump and Lee at the White House[4], where South Korean firms pledged $150 billion in U.S. investments. In July, Seoul pledged another $350 billion in U.S. projects in an effort to reduce Trump’s threatened tariffs, which he later set at 15%.
References
- ^ massive immigration raid on a Hyundai facility (www.nbcnews.com)
- ^ arrested 475 people on Thursday — mostly South Korean nationals (www.nbcnews.com)
- ^ Trump administration’s escalating crackdown on immigrants (www.nbcnews.com)
- ^ a summit between Trump and Lee at the White House (www.nbcnews.com)