Early this morning, a Korean Airlines plane carrying over 300 South Korean workers released from their detention in Georgia landed at Incheon International Airport near Seoul, ending a week-long nightmare that has created a serious crisis in US-Korean relations.
A total of 330 passengers were on board, including 316 Korean nationals — one detainee had chosen to remain in the United States — 10 Chinese, 3 Japanese and 1 Indonesian citizen. The passengers had been held at detention facilities in southern Georgia, including the Folkston ICE Processing Center…
The Korean nationals had been detained on Sept. 4 at the construction site of the LG Energy Solution-Hyundai Motor joint battery plant in Ellabell, Georgia. After eight days in custody, they returned home and were scheduled to reunite with family and friends at the arrivals hall of Incheon Airport’s Terminal 2 after completing immigration procedures
Upon their arrival, the Korean media swarmed around them to get the workers’ response to their ordeal. What they heard (in the Reuters clip above) was a combination of anger and anguish. “Nobody is going to stay and work when it's like this,' said an LG Energy Solutions subcontractor.” Another passenger told of “being treated like criminals [by the United States], “which is very unpleasant.”
My BBC interview ran just before the plane landed. I began (at the 3-minute mark) by talking about how extraordinary it is to see a South Korean president, conservative or liberal, openly critize the United States like President Lee Jae Myung did this week. Lee, who had just visited the White House a week before the raid, called the ICE operation an “unjust infringement” on Korean rights and warned at a press conference that Korean companies will be “very hesitant” about investing in the United States after such treatment.
My host then asked about Hyundai and LG and their responsibility for not acquiring the correct visas to suit ICE and the Trump administration. I pointed out that none of the arrested workers were from either Hyundai or LG but instead were employed by some of the subcontractors used by the larger companies. As I wrote with labor reporter Mike Elk in a Substack post last week, the companies did screw up, and should share the blame for some of what wrong. But neither the employers or their workers deserved the humiliating and disgraceful treatment they received from ICE and the Trump administration. That was beyond the pale.
I also thought it was important for BBC to understand the reasons Korean people were so disturbed at the vicious, military-style operation at the Hyundai/LG plant. As I say in the interview, South Korea was under military dictatorship from 1961 to 1987. Many of its citizens have PTSD from the brutality of the authoritarian governments of Park Chung Hee and Chun Doo Hwan and the violence of their attacks on workers and organized labor during the 1970s and 1980s.
In Georgia, they observed the same kind of brutal treatment their parents and relatives experienced during the era of authoritarian government. And for many, the incident in Georgia, and Trump’s flippant response to it, was humiliating.
Consider the response of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, which I posted in my Notes this week.
The crackdown, reminiscent of wartime operations and mobilizing a massive force of police vehicles, military vehicles, helicopters, and drones, is not simply law enforcement; it's a showy and insulting political stunt.
The sight of workers being dragged away in shackles and handcuffs has deeply shocked and angered Korean society. This is a clear violation of human rights and a breach of alliances.
Another aspect to this fiasco was Trump’s demand that some of the workers arrested by ICE stay behind to help build the plant. According to Washington Post reporter Michelle Yee He Lee, “President Trump temporarily delayed the repatriation of more than 300 South Korean workers…to explore whether they could stay in the U.S. to educate and train American workers, but the vast majority opted to leave.” Her story focused on the critical discussions between ROK Foreign Cho Hyun and Secretary of State Mark Rubio (who is also Trump’s national security adviser).
Cho learned from Rubio that Trump had halted the release to “understand Seoul’s position on whether they should stay to educate and train U.S. workers or return home, given that the detained South Korean nationals are all skilled workers,” a South Korean Foreign Ministry official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe diplomatic discussions. Cho told Rubio that Seoul wanted to bring the South Korean nationals home and they could return at a later date, according to the Foreign Ministry. Washington agreed to that, the ministry said.
Trump was basically asking the ROK government to persuade these workers to stay in a creative use of forced labor. He (and certainly Rubio) should know that such an act would remind Koreans of the forced labor their ancestors experienced at the hands of the Japanese empire during World War II to “make Japan great again” and would be viewed negatively and even with horror by Korean citizens. Trump’s demand was just another humiliation of the ROK.
Hankyoreh, South Korea’s most progressive daily, went even further today, comparing ICE’s treatment of Korean workers to slavery. This editorial, by writer Park Hyun, is worth reading as you consider what I said to the BBC about Korea’s response to this treatment.
Trump is fundamentally a populist and white supremacist. His slogan of “Make America Great Again” would be phrased more accurately as “Make White America Great Again.” His insistence on imposing a 50% tariff specifically on steel and aluminum stems from the fact that white, Protestant populations are concentrated in the American Rust Belt.
The massive crackdown on allegedly undocumented immigrants at the Hyundai-LG Energy Solution plant in Georgia must also be understood within this context. The sight of our workers being led out in chains resembles images of African slaves in the 18th and 19th centuries being dragged out by their owners. The Department of Homeland Security boasted that the raid was “the largest single-site enforcement operation in [its] history,” and Immigration and Customs Enforcement even brazenly released footage of the operation — which clearly risks human rights violations — as if to flaunt these arrests as their achievement.
Far-right white Americans may have rejoiced inwardly at this incident. Even politicians like the governor of Georgia and local lawmakers, who had previously been enthusiastic about hosting the factory, have abruptly changed their stance and joined the chorus of discontent. This shift is likely because it’s difficult to ignore the anti-immigrant sentiment among Americans born into citizenship. The US is in the grip of an irrational frenzy, reminiscent of the McCarthyism that swept through American society in the 1950s. The US could have resolved this visa issue diplomatically by giving Korea advance notice as an ally. Yet, the crackdown — complete with helicopters and armored vehicles, as if to gleefully flaunt their power — can only be explained as a political performance.
That’s exactly what it was; South Korea gets it. I summarized up my conclusions today on Twitter/X. “Time to break this so-called ‘alliance,’ I wrote. “South Korea should never trust the United States again. Forget Trump's tirades and stand up for your sovereignty and economic and labor leadership in the world. We who support Korean independence will be in solidarity with you all the way.” 🌺
