In the wake of mass arrests of South Korean nationals in the United States on September 4, South Korea’s President, Lee Jae Myung, said companies in his country will likely hesitate to maintain or make direct investments in the US if it fails to improve its visa system and rules for Korean workers.
In a news conference marking 100 days in office, Lee called for improvements in the US visa system as he spoke about the immigration raid in Georgia, US, by ICE agents that resulted in the arrest of more than 300 South Korean workers at a battery factory under construction at Hyundai's sprawling auto plant in the American city.
While the Korean workers are set to be brought home on Friday aboard a charter plane after negotiations took place between South Korea and the US, video footage of the massive roundup showing some workers in chains and handcuffs sparked widespread anger and a sense of betrayal in South Korea, which pledged hundreds of billions of dollars into US industrial investments against the backdrop of a decaying job market at home.
To add insult to injury, the raid came less than two weeks after a summit between US President Donald Trump and Lee. In the July trade agreement between the two countries, the Trump administration had spared South Korea, its long-term ally, the highest tariffs only after Seoul pledged USD 350 billion in new US investments.
Lee said the raids show the “cultural difference” between the two countries and how they handle immigration issues.
“In South Korea, we see Americans coming on tourist visas to teach English at private cram schools – they do it all the time, and we don't think much of it, it's just something you accept,” Lee said.
“But the United States clearly doesn't see things that way. On top of that, US immigration authorities pledge to strictly forbid illegal immigration and employment and carry out deportations in various aggressive ways, and our people happened to be caught in one of those cases,” he added.
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Lawmakers from both Lee's liberal Democratic Party and the conservative opposition have decried the detentions as outrageous and heavy-handed, with South Korea's biggest newspaper comparing the raid to a “rabbit hunt” executed by US immigration authorities in a zeal to meet an alleged White House goal of 3,000 arrests a day.
During the news conference, Lee said South Korean and US officials are discussing a possible improvement to the US visa system, but added that under the current system, South Korean companies “can’t help hesitating a lot” about making direct investments in the US.
“It's not like these are long-term workers. When you build a facility or install equipment at a plant, you need technicians, but the United States doesn't have that workforce and yet they won't issue visas to let our people stay and do the work,” he said.
“If that's not possible, then establishing a local facility in the United States will either come with severe disadvantages or become very difficult for our companies. They will wonder whether they should even do it,” Lee added.
South Korean companies have been relying on short-term visitor visas or Electronic System for Travel Authorisation to send workers who are needed to launch manufacturing sites and handle other setup tasks, a practice that had been largely tolerated for years.
Following the incident, South Korean Foreign Minister, Cho Hyun, who met US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, in Washington said Wednesday that US officials have agreed to allow the workers detained in Georgia to later return to finish their work at the site.
Before leaving for the US on Monday, Cho told lawmakers that more South Korean workers in the US could be vulnerable to future crackdowns if the visa issue isn't resolved, but said Seoul does not yet have an estimate of how many might be at risk.
The two countries have also agreed to set up a joint working group for discussions on creating a new visa category to make it easier for South Korean companies to send their staff to work in the United States, he informed.
The Georgia battery plant is one of more than 20 major industrial sites that South Korean companies are currently building in the United States. They include other battery factories in Georgia and several other states, a semiconductor plant in Texas, and a shipbuilding project in Philadelphia, a sector Trump has frequently highlighted in relation to South Korea.
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