South Koreans feel betrayed by workforce detentions at Georgia Hyundai plant

Audio By Carbonatix

Enlarge

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s foreign minister departed for the U.S. on Monday to finalize steps for the return of several hundred South Korean workers detained in a massive immigration raid in Georgia, a spectacle that has caused confusion, shock and a sense of betrayal among many in the U.S.-allied nation.

The Sept. 4 raid on a battery factory under construction at a sprawling Hyundai auto plant resulted in the detainment of 475 workers, more than 300 them South Koreans. Some were shown being shackled with chains around their hands, ankles and waists in video released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

South Korea announced Sunday that the U.S. has agreed to release them and that it would bring them home on a charter flight once final administrative steps are completed.

President Donald Trump said the workers “were here illegally,” and that instead, the U.S. needs to work out arrangements with countries like South Korea to bring their experts in to train U.S. citizens to do work such as battery and computer manufacturing.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told reporters in London that Trump sent a “powerful” message to investors and their employees.

“His message today that he sent to the world was, ‘Listen, our laws will be enforced, and we’re encouraging all companies who want to come to the United States and help our economy and employ people, that we encourage them to employ U.S. citizens and to bring people to our country that want to follow our laws and work here the right way,’” she said.

Appearing at a legislative hearing before his departure, Foreign Minister Cho Hyun called the raid “a very serious matter” that he hadn’t anticipated at all, as many lawmakers lamented the American operation.

“If U.S. authorities detain hundreds of Koreans in this manner, almost like a military operation, how can South Korean companies investing in the U.S. continue to invest properly in the future?” said Cho Jeongsik, a lawmaker from the liberal governing Democratic Party.

Another lawmaker, Kim Gi-hyeon from the conservative opposition People Power Party, said the “unacceptable” raid dealt South Korea a “severe blow that will be difficult to heal.”

Some lawmakers even called for the government to retaliate by investigating Americans who are alleged to work illegally in South Korea.

Seoul has expressed regret over the raid, but experts say it won’t likely take any major tit-for-tat measures given the country’s security dependence on the U.S. in deterring potential North Korean aggressions and other spheres of cooperation between the two countries, including business ties.

The Trump administration has made a series of workplace raids to fulfill its mass deportation agenda, but this was the Homeland Security agency’s largest yet at a single site, and targeted Georgia, a symbol of bilateral cooperation where many large South Korean businesses operate and plan future investments.

Particularly stunning is that this raid came only weeks after South Korea promised to pour hundreds of billions of dollars into U.S. investments as part of a tariff deal, and days after Trump and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung held their first summit meeting in Washington on Aug. 25.

“The way that Trump is pressuring the Korean government and inflicting damages on its people is very rough and unilateral,” said Kim Taewoo, former head of Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification. “Can this be forgotten easily in South Korea? In a long-term perspective, it won’t be good for U.S. national interests as well.”

In an editorial Monday, South Korea’s biggest newspaper, Chosun Ilbo, wrote that “Fundamental doubts emerge: What does the U.S. mean by ‘alliance,’ and are investment benefits guaranteed across administrations?”

Paik Wooyeal, a professor at Seoul’s Yonsei University said the U.S. goal of restoring manufacturing through foreign investments is colliding with its lack of visa and immigration systems that could support such an effort.

South Korean companies operating in the U.S. will likely suffer “a great confusion” as they will now be forced to bring workers back home to resolve visa issues, he said. Such developments would undermine U.S. interests, but Trump won’t likely make any concessions anytime soon, Paik predicted.

Steven Schrank, the lead Georgia agent of Homeland Security Investigations, said Friday that some of the detained workers had illegally crossed the U.S. border, while others had entered legally but had expired visas or had entered on a visa waiver that prohibited them from working.

But South Korean officials and experts have expressed frustration over what they call strict U.S. limits on visas for highly skilled foreign workers to protect its domestic workforce, and inaction on Seoul’s calls to expand work visas for skilled South Korean nationals. As a result, South Korean companies have been relying on short-term visitor visas or the Electronic System for Travel Authorization to send the workers they need to launch manufacturing facilities or handle other setup tasks.

“The incident will inevitably exacerbate shortages of skilled workers with legal work authorization and create pressure for increases in labor costs, potentially disrupting operations and rising costs across major business projects in the United States,” South Korea’s Eugene Investment & Securities said in a report Monday.

Daishin Securities, meanwhile, predicted in a report that the raid could delay operations at the targeted battery plant, which was slated to begin production early next year, potentially affecting Hyundai’s EV business in America.

During Monday’s legislative hearing, Cho, the foreign minister, told lawmakers that the U.S. had “not responded adequately” to South Korea’s requests to expand visas for its workers, and that Seoul plans to use this raid as an opportunity to move related negotiations forward.

Cho said some of the people detained in Georgia may need to return to the site to complete their work at the factory, and that South Korean officials are negotiating to ensure they can reenter the United States.

“I will clearly point out to them that a delay in (the factory’s) completion would also cause significant losses for the United States,” Cho said.

____=

Associated Press writer Jill Lawless in London contributed.