Hundreds of workers from a factory under construction in Georgia to make car batteries for electric vehicles Hyundai and Kia were held during a massive raid by immigration and customs application (ICE) on Thursday, which stopped construction.
The installation is part of what would be the greatest industrial investment in state history and had been praised as a huge boost for the economy by the Republican Governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp.
At least 450 people were arrested, according to the Atlanta office of the American agency of the Ministry of Justice, the Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
However, Korea Economic Daily later reported that around 560 workers in the Hyundai Facility and LG Energy (LGES) solution had been detained, citing unidentified industry sources. Some 300 are South Korean nationals, according to local media reports. Hyundai Motor is a South Korean automotive company but has many international factories.
The RAID Thursday made a setback on the substantial project of the company in Georgia and was a spectacular iteration of the hard repression of the Trump administration against immigrants in the United States.
It has also shown the disruptive impact that Donald Trump’s mass expulsion program has on businesses, even though the White House is trying to stimulate more foreign investor entries.
An agent of the Ministry of Internal Security (DHS) said that several federal agencies, including ICE, the FBI and the DEA, “carried out an operation to apply the law authorized by the justice, because we actively conduct an investigation into illegal employment practices”.
“Arrests are underway,” said Steven Schrank, the special agent in charge of internal security surveys for Georgia.
A government official representing South Korea, Hyundai Motor’s home, said those arrested were held in an ice detention center.
The South Korea Foreign Ministry said that “many of our nationals” have been detained and have expressed their concern about the impact of the raid.
“The economic activities of our businesses invest in the United States and the interests of our citizens should not be unduly raped during the American police,” the spokesman Lee Jae-Woong said on Friday in a statement.
The installation of batteries production, a joint venture between the Longes South Korean battery manufacturer and the Hyundai engine, was to start operations at the end of this year, according to Lges, to electric vehicles.
A spokesperson for Hyundai-Ga Battery Company in Georgia said in a statement that she was fully co-opted and that she had interrupted construction work.
Hyundai Motor said its production of electric vehicles on the sprawling site was not affected.
In 2023, Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution (LGES) announced the company of $ 4.3 billion to produce EV battery cells, each company holding a participation of 50%. The plant will provide batteries for Hyundai, Kia and Genesis EV models.
The battery plant is one of the investments of 12.6 billion dollars in Hyundai in Georgia, including the car factory which has just opened the automaker, in what would be “the largest economic development project in state history” and is part of a larger investment in American industry by the South Korean company, announced in March while Trump increased on the tariffs.
A video sequence on social networks has shown a man wearing a vest with HIS letters, an acronym for Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), telling workers yellow safety vests: “We have a search warrant for the whole site. We need the construction to stop immediately. We need all the work to finish on the site now. ”
Trump said he wanted to expel “the worst of the worst” criminals, but ice figures showed an increase in non-criminals. Defenders of rights denounced these raids.
While the internal security surveys carried out the raid, the federal officers were helped by the Georgia Department of Public Safety and the state soldiers, according to local media.
Meanwhile, in the north of New York State, another important ice raid took place in the installations of the nutrition bar confectioners near Syracuse, where snack bars are made in a family concern, attracting the anger of the governor of the State.
The agents forced the entry into the industrial installation and held dozens of workers.
“I am indignant by the ice raids this morning in Cato and Fulton, where more than 40 adults were seized, including parents of at least a dozen children at risk of returning from school to an empty house,” said Kathy Hochul, Democratic Governor of New York, in a statement published by his office.
“I clearly indicated it, New York will work with the federal government to guarantee our borders and expel violent criminals, but we will never defend masked ice agents separating families and abandoning children,” added Hochul.
The Defense of Rural & Migrant Migrant Defense Minister said on Facebook that he had estimated that more than 70 workers had been arrested.
Reuters contributed the reports
