I’ve been confused by reading the articles and comments on this matter. Are they in the country illegally ?
Regardless I am glad the workers get to go home. If it is illegal I’d imagine the company should be at fault.
Regardless I am glad the workers get to go home. If it is illegal I’d imagine the company should be at fault.
According to the article, 450 were arrested, over 300 are South Korean, but the article makes it impossible to tell who entered illegally, and who had incorrect visas or expired ones, and their various nationalities.
Koreans can come to US without visa, but that visa doesn’t allow you to work. That means no hands on work at the site. Considering the raids happening at the factory itself, I would really be surprised if they are only there to receive training by their US counterparts, which seems pretty unlikely.
As immigrants, our visa status has been tracked by day one, and constantly validated. It boggles my mind why Hyundai didn’t just pay to apply for H2B visa, to invite those workers to come here legally. Yeah it takes time and money but it is the correct thing to do
Maybe Korean companies are used to getting away with that kind of thing? Seems fairly short sighted given the current focus on immigration.
I have sympathy for the workers. In reality it is the immmigration attorneys or other members of the company who need to be sanctioned.
The problem is that the US is sending deeply conflicting messages. Does it want Hyundai's investment or not? It's not that Hyundai needs to build a factory in the middle of nowhere in Georgia.
It’s only logical that if you operate in the U.S. you follow basic U.S. laws.
The problem is Hyundai chose their subcontractors very poorly.
That is the current administration’s policy, yes.
This claim isn’t in the article. Articles that do mention the detention site mention one with a medical center and a library
But if you take things at face value, this isn’t a case where ICE is going berserker mode. They went through investigation and obtained search warrants.
Regardless how they handle detention, the only conclusion is to send them back. Thankfully it seems swift so the workers won’t endure long uncertainty.
Last but not least. One of the arguments of said investment, is to boost local employment, in exchange of other benefits, mostly tax reduction. It is a two way door
Then why is it doing so? I'm lost.
Are you implying that it's an act of charity towards the US with zero expectation of or potential for profit? Then why doesn't Hyundai just save the management trouble and donate to a charity?
https://www.vancouverobserver.com/news/we-are-scared-and-we-...
I mean, I understand public humiliation is something Usians like, but was it necessary here? To me, punishing the workers is so unimaginably cruel and pointless...
Source?
https://www.youtube.com/live/AD7n_nSOorU
4:30 Describes the search warrants and arrests.
5:10 "475 were illegally present in the United States"
6:25 "Majority were Korean nationals"
No criminal charges yet. It's an ongoing investigation.
Not quite; The figure includes those with visa.
"Illegally present in the United States or in violation of their presence in the united states, working unlawfully"
This also leaves open the question of what "violation of the visa" entails here. They may well have been working within their visas, only for ICE to arbitrarily rule otherwise.
As this comment[1] states with an official source:
> A B-1 visa may be granted to specialized workers going to the United States to install, service, or repair commercial or industrial equipment or machinery purchased from a company outside of the United States, or to train U.S. workers to perform such services.
Maybe the business use of ESTA also covers the above use cases?
Example from 2022: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyundai_Alabama_child_labor_al...
This was done for theatre effect.