United States President Donald Trump proposed that South Korean immigrants detained at the Hyundai battery factory in Georgia could stay in the country so that they, in return, trained from American workers. The information was reported by the president of South Korea, Lee Jae Myung. Still, almost all workers chose to return to South Korea. Only one agreed to stay in the US.
Trump’s offer would have caused a day delay in the chartered flight departure to repact the detainees, as there was negotiation between American and South Korean authorities about the proposal. Lee Jae Myung said the boarding was interrupted as these alternatives were evaluated.
Immigrants had been detained in an operation of the US Immigration and Customs Service (ICE). In all, 475 people were arrested, of which more than 300 are South Koreans. Many of the detainees worked through such visas or B-1, which usually do not authorize certain work, as pointed out lawyers and sources involved in the case.
South Korea has expressed diplomatically strong concern. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the country’s government has mobilized to ensure that workers’ return was treated with dignity, including request so that there was no use of handcuffs and that there were no penalties for future re -entry in the US.
The situation also drew attention to the impacts on South Korean investments in the United States, especially in high-tech industrial projects. The episode is part of a context of migratory and regulatory tension, with companies claiming that they had been facing difficulties in obtaining appropriate visas for technical experts.