SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The South Korean government announced Sunday that over 300 South Korean workers, detained after a major immigration raid at a Hyundai plant in Georgia, will be released and returned to their home country.
Kang Hoon-sik, chief of staff for President Lee Jae Myung, stated that South Korea and the U.S. have concluded negotiations for the workers’ release. South Korea plans to dispatch a charter plane to bring the workers back once remaining administrative procedures are finalized.
Foreign Minister Cho Hyun is to leave for the U.S. on Monday for talks related to the workers’ releases, South Korean media reported.
On Friday, U.S. immigration authorities reported that they had detained 475 individuals, the majority being South Korean nationals, during a raid at Hyundai’s expansive manufacturing site in Georgia, where the automaker builds electric vehicles. The agents concentrated on a facility, still under construction, in partnership with LG Energy Solution for battery production in EVs.
Cho said that more than 300 South Koreans were among the detained.
This operation was the latest of numerous workplace raids under the Trump administration’s mass deportation policy. However, Thursday’s raid was notable both for its size and because the site has long been described as Georgia’s largest economic development project.
The raid shocked many in South Korea, an important U.S. ally. In July, South Korea agreed to procure $100 billion in U.S. energy and invest $350 billion in the U.S. in exchange for reduced U.S. tariff rates. Just two weeks prior, U.S. President Donald Trump and Lee had their inaugural meeting in Washington.
President Lee emphasized that South Korean citizens’ rights and companies’ economic pursuits should not be unfairly disrupted during U.S. law enforcement actions. South Korea’s Foreign Ministry issued a separate statement expressing “concern and regret” about the incident and dispatched diplomats to the site.
Video released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Saturday showed a caravan of vehicles driving up to the site and then federal agents directing workers to line up outside. Some detainees were ordered to put their hands up against a bus as they were frisked and then shackled around their hands, ankles and waist.
Most of the people detained were taken to an immigration detention center in Folkston, Georgia, near the Florida state line. None has been charged with any crimes yet, Steven Schrank, the lead Georgia agent of Homeland Security Investigations, said during a news conference Friday, adding that the investigation was ongoing.
He said that some of the detained workers had illegally crossed the U.S. border, while others had entered the country legally but had expired visas or had entered on a visa waiver that prohibited them from working.
Kang, the South Korean presidential chief of staff, said that South Korea will push to review and improve visa systems for those traveling to the U.S. on business trips for investment projects.
