Tag: illegal immigration

If the ROK government provides legal status to the babies of illegal immigrants they will create further incentive for illegal immigrants to come to South Korea. They only have to look at what happened in the U.S. to see what will happen in the ROK:

Multiple bills aimed at establishing a birth registration system for undocumented migrant children born in South Korea remain pending in the National Assembly, leaving thousands of children without legal recognition and access to basic services, despite growing calls for legislative action.

At least two proposals pending in the parliament seek to create a legal framework allowing the registration, certification and amendment of birth records for non-Korean children, who are currently excluded from the country’s family registry system. No law has yet been enacted.

Under existing rules, children born to foreign parents cannot be formally registered at birth even if they are born in South Korea, as the family registry system applies only to Korean nationals. Without a resident registration number, many face difficulties accessing health care, education, child care and social protection.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

I read this article about supposed human rights violations of the Hyundai workers expecting something horrible and yet the worst thing that happened was they had to share four toilets and two urinals with 72 other people. This guy likely conducted his mandatory service in the ROK military where the conditions are very similar:

A South Korean worker who returned home after days of detention in a U.S. immigration raid has recounted details of human rights violations, saying U.S. agents laughed at the worker in a scornful manner during interrogation, among other inhumane treatment.

The worker, who declined to be identified, shared a personal log of the ordeal with Yonhap News Agency after returning home Friday along with 329 others, including 14 foreigners, who had been arrested in the raid at the site jointly run by Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution on Sept. 4.

The worker managed to record the ordeal during detention by secretly taking pen and paper provided to them to fill out documents.

Yonhap

You can read the rest at the link, but this guy was really offended about some ICE agent making a “Rocket Man” joke he didn’t even understand.

The Lee administration is still playing the victim card over the detainment of the South Korean illegal immmigrants and the State Department is playing right into this narrative:

A senior U.S. state department official on Sunday expressed regrets over the recent mass detention of South Korean workers in America and vowed to prevent similar occurrences.

Christopher Landau, deputy secretary of state, visited Seoul for a meeting with South Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Park Yoon-joo.

According to Seoul’s foreign ministry, Landau conveyed his deep regrets over the detention of hundreds of South Korean workers in an immigration crackdown earlier this month at an electric vehicle battery plant construction site for a joint venture between Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution in Bryan County, Georgia. A total of 316 South Korean workers returned home Friday, after being held in a detention center for a week.

Landau also said U.S. President Donald Trump has a keen interest in the matter and ensured that those who have returned home will not face any disadvantages when reentering the United States. The state department official said Washington would try to ensure there would be no further incidents of a similar nature in the future.

Landau proposed working-level talks on issuing proper visas for South Korean workers in the U.S., citing a need to provide institutional support for South Korean corporations’ investments that contribute to the American economy and manufacturing.

In response, Park touched upon inconveniences that South Korean workers faced while in detention and said the general public in South Korea, in addition to the workers themselves, felt deeply shocked by the crackdown.

According to the ministry, Park also strongly urged the U.S. to take practical steps and implement systematic improvements to ease South Korean people’s concerns.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but the message Landau should have matched what U.S. Commerce Secretary Lutnick recently said that the U.S. wants Korean business, just come in on a proper visa. If you are having problems let us know and we will resolve it. Instead this “regret” wording just feeds into the victim narrative the Lee administration is promoting.

I can’t argue with anything Lutnick is saying. America wants your business just enter the country the right way because the Trump administration is enforcing immigration laws:

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Thursday that he had told Hyundai Motor Group to get the “right visa” and call him if it has visa problems, as he commented on its workers who were arrested in last week’s immigration raid at a Georgia battery plant construction site.

He made the remarks in an Axios interview, as 316 Korean workers headed back home in the morning following their release from a detention center in Folkston, Georgia, a week after their arrest in the raid at the site run by a joint Hyundai-LG Energy Solution venture in Bryan County near Savannah.

“I called up the Koreans, I said, oh, give me a break. Get the right visa and if you’re having problems getting the right visa, call me. I’ll call (Homeland Security Secretary) Kristi Noem,” he said during his appearance on the “Axios Show.”

“We’ll help you get the right visa, but don’t do it the wrong way. You can’t do things the old way. Donald Trump requires you to do it correctly,” he added.

The secretary said that the Korean workers detained in the raid came to the U.S. on tourist visas, emphasizing that Hyundai should have gotten them the “proper visa.”

“Hyundai is a total grown-up, more than capable of getting them the proper visa,” he said.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

The return of the detained Koreans is now complete:

A total of 316 Korean workers who were detained in a recent U.S. immigration crackdown headed back home aboard a chartered plane Thursday, in a voluntary yet bitter departure amid renewed questions in Seoul over U.S. credibility as a reliable ally.

The Korean Air plane carrying them and 14 non-Korean nationals took off from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in Atlanta at noon, a week after their arrest in the raid at an electric vehicle battery plant construction site for a joint venture between Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution in Bryan County, Georgia.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but this immigration crackdown is ultimately going to be a good thing for Korean businesses. First of all the U.S. government saying these detained workers will not be disadvantaged from receiving a proper work visa in the future.

Secondly the U.S. government is going to set up a working group to expand employee visas for Korean businesses operating in the U.S. It appears that these businesses have been able to skirt immigration laws for so long there was never an urgency to get the situation fixed. Now due to enforcement there is an urgency to fix the problem which in the long run is good for Korean businesses.

It looks like the detained Koreans in Georgia are going to be held a little while longer:

The planned departure of hundreds of Korean workers detained in Georgia during an immigration raid has been delayed, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced Wednesday, due to “a cause from the U.S. side.”

It did not explain what the cause was, raising concerns that their detention could be extended.

The ministry said in a message to reporters that the plane’s departure, which was initially planned for 2:30 p.m. Wednesday (local time) from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, was postponed, without stating a new departure time.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

So does this mean 6 in 10 Koreans would not mind 400 people from a foreign country showing up and constructing a building in Seoul on improper visas?:

A majority of Koreans said they were disappointed in the U.S. government following the recent mass detention of Korean workers at a battery plant in Georgia, a poll showed Tuesday.

According to a survey of more than 500 adults recently conducted by Realmeter, 59.2 percent of respondents said they view the immigration crackdown on Hyundai Motor Group-LG Energy Solution’s factory site as “excessive” and expressed disappointment with the Donald Trump administration’s actions. Only 30.7 found the measures “understandable and inevitable.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

It looks like Korea’s “Bali-Bali” culture led to the Hyundai and LG workers not wanting to wait and go through the H1B visa process:

Many of those reportedly entered the US using B1 visas — issued for business purposes, such as attending meetings or signing contracts — or through the Electronic System for Travel Authorization visa waiver program for short-term stays. US immigration officials said that was the central issue in the raid.

Foreign nationals must acquire an appropriate visa such as the H-1B, L1 or E2 to legally obtain employment at workplaces located in the US. But as those visas can take months to obtain and their numbers are capped, they are often deemed impractical for companies that need to dispatch workers frequently or on short notice. Industry officials also complain that wait times for all types of visas have lengthened since the start of the Trump administration.

According to Korean media reports, the US allocates annual H-1B visa quotas to certain countries with which it has free trade agreements, including Canada, Mexico, Singapore, Chile and Australia. Despite having a free trade agreement with the US, South Korea does not receive a quota.

In response to the concern, an official from Seoul’s Foreign Ministry, who requested anonymity, noted that H-1B visas are distributed through a lottery. The official said that the ministry has repeatedly urged the US government and Congress since 2012 to create a separate visa quota for Korean professionals, such as via the proposed Partner With Korea Act.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link, but I wonder how many of the jobs the detained Joreans were doing could have been done by Americans?

It will be interesting to see if the personnel deported will be allowed back into the country again in the future with a proper work visa. With that said I am sure every Korean business is reviewing visa status of their workers now:

The Korean government said Sunday that talks with U.S. authorities to release more than 300 Korean workers detained in Georgia were finished, and that only administrative steps remained before a chartered plane would be dispatched to bring them home.

Presidential chief of staff Kang Hoon-sik announced the development at a high-level policy meeting in Seoul, saying the release as imminent thanks to swift cooperation among government ministries, business groups and companies.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

The left is turning to their usual playbook of “racial profiling” to try and stop ICE from deporting illegal immigrants:

A photo of a Korean man who was arrested, Jan. 28, in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s crackdown on illegal immigration on charges of possessing sexually exploitative materials involving minors. The original image was shared uncensored. Captured from White House’s X

U.S. President Donald Trump’s massive immigration crackdown across the country is sparking fear, disruption and frustration in both expected and unexpected ways in Korean communities.

Some 110,000 undocumented Koreans, as estimated by the Pew Research Center, are scattered throughout the United States, but in reality, experts say there are many more, and Trump’s sweeping clampdown promises to weed them out.

On. Jan. 31, the White House said a Korean national was arrested for the first time in the latest operation by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Living undocumented in Atlanta, the Korean man was found guilty of possessing sexually explicit material depicting minors, according to U.S. authorities.

He is one of nearly 1,000 migrants arrested daily in the immigration crackdown, which the Trump administration claims targets illegal residents with criminal records, such as assault, robbery and driving under the influence.

However, local media reports say many of the arrested migrants have not committed any criminal offenses — a concern that’s putting some people on edge.

“It’s not just criminal illegal immigrants. It’s not even just illegal immigrants. It’s people of color who are being randomly targeted,” said Sam Kim, 39, a U.S. citizen living in Los Angeles, who is trying to mobilize efforts to advocate against what he considers “racial profiling.”

“Criminals need to get punished. I’m not arguing against that,” Kim noted. “But legal, hardworking Koreans in the U.S. should not be mistreated just because of the way we look and speak.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but if you are in the country legally you shouldn’t have any worries about being deported by ICE.