Four hundred seventy-five workers were arrested at a joint Hyundai and LG Energy Solutions electric-vehicle battery plant under construction in Ellabell, Georgia, on September 4. It was the largest immigration raid at a single location in US history.
The detained workers, most of whom were employed by subcontractors, were shackled with chains around their hands, ankles, and waists in a video released by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. LG said forty-seven of its employees were also detained.
The workers were building a sprawling $7.6 billion taxpayer-subsidized manufacturing facility, touted as the largest economic development project in Georgia’s history.
The raid was “part of a dangerous, escalating pattern of government agencies arresting people at schools, neighborhoods, airports, and workplaces with growing impunity all over the US,” said Migrant Equity Southeast, a local immigrant rights organization.
The raids at Hyundai throw into sharp relief the impunity of President Donald Trump’s brutal immigration crackdown. They also shine a spotlight on Hyundai’s employment and labor practices, including hiring workers on short-term visitor visas that prohibit working in the United States.
Many companies have used these and other inappropriate visas to exploit vulnerable workers. Korean manufacturers have also used them to build their facilities.
“It is standard industry practice to send experts from another country to set up and install new high-tech equipment,” said Art Wheaton, director of labor studies at Cornell University’s…
Auteur: Luis Feliz Leon
