[updated: See addition at bottom]

Extortion is the practice of obtaining benefit through coercion. In most jurisdictions it is likely to constitute a criminal offence.... "Making unfounded threats in order to obtain an unfair business advantage is a form of extortion. Extortion is sometimes called the "protection racket" because the racketeers often phrase their demands as payment for "protection" from threats from unspecified other parties; though often, and almost always, such "protection" is simply abstinence of harm from the same party, and such is implied in the "protection" offer.

By rounding up some 500 Korean workers at a Hyundai plant near Savanah, in the backward state of Georgia, and accusing them of being "illegal aliens" when they were brought in by their company to run the US-based plant, Donald Trump is extorting the company.

The problem is not that these South Koreans, who hail from the thriving country of South Korea, are coming illegally into the US. They all were sponsored by their mother company in South Korea and by the subsidiary in the US. They were all vetted and given legal papers to live and work in the US.

The real issue is that Trump want Hyundai to hire American workers, instead of importing its own workers. So he comes up with excuses and pretexts to kick vaulable foreigners out of the country.

Problem is that the Americans Trump wants Hyundai to hire are incompetent and do not have the required skills, especially in the inbred slavery state of Georgia. It will take time to train the braindead Georgians and get them working at the required speed of business. Americans are very poor when it comes to foreign languages, so how are these MAGA imbeciles from Georgia going to communicate with Koreans?

American companies that invest overseas do the same thing: They bring their own people from the states because they have the experience and the skills. But double standards are Trump's motto.

Then there is the humiliating "format" of rounding up hundreds of visiting Koreans like they were criminals. Instead of discussing the matter with the company management and finding a compromise, Trump jumps on the occasion to pretend to want jobs for Americans while at the same time jailing and humiliating those workers. It's his racist cruelty behind all this. He can then brag to his fat MAGA "influencers' that he is fighting foreigners and fighting for Americans, and the numskull idiots of MAGA cheer him for his bullying and his racism.

How do German car manufacturers (BMW, Mercedes for example) with plants in the US handle the situtation? Do they bring in German nationals for a period of time before gradually handing the process to US workers? Or is it that the Germans - white with a shining history of white supremacist hatred - are more in line with his demented brain?

How about Honda, Nissan, Mazda and other Japanese makers in the US? Is Trump going to go after them like stray dogs and send his Getsapo-ICE to arrest and round up people?

Finally, given this inimical atmosphere that a demented racist old geezer is creating, these companies might fold, leave the backward southern states where they operate, go to Canada or Mexico, leaving the idiot holding the bag of losing foreign investments. Sure, he can threaten them with tariffs, but at some point the kind of respect that Donald Dump is demanding is too high a price to pay.

Trump's single idea is MONEY. He has no understanding of international relations and the soft power of the US. He's like a lowly grocery store owner who chases away customers for stupid reasons, then finds himself under.
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Trump Demands ‘Respect’ After Massive Immigration Raid
Janna Brancolini
Mon, September 8, 2025

Andrew Harnik / Getty Images

President Donald Trump issued a warning to the very same foreign companies he is pushing to invest in the United States, telling them to “respect” immigration laws and to hire American workers.

Days after immigration officials shocked South Korea, a close ally of the U.S., by arresting hundreds of people at a Hyundai battery factory under construction near Savannah, Georgia, Trump attempted to defend the raid in a Truth Social post on Sunday.

“Following the Immigration Enforcement Operation on the Hyundai Battery Plant in Georgia, I am hereby calling on all Foreign Companies investing in the United States to please respect our Nation’s Immigration Laws,” he wrote.

“Your Investments are welcome, and we encourage you to LEGALLY bring your very smart people, with great technical talent, to build World Class products, and we will make it quickly and legally possible for you to do so. What we ask in return is that you hire and train American Workers,” Trump added.

U.S. immigration officials raided a Hyundai plant just 10 days after President Donald Trump met with South Korean President Lee Jae-myung and pledged closer economic cooperation between the two countries. / Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Officials announced last week that they had arrested about 450 “unlawful aliens” at the site, though Korean media sources said the number of people detained could be as high as 560.

About 300 of the people detained were South Korean nationals, including employees of a different South Korean company who were visiting the plant during a business trip.

The president’s signature economic policy has involved imposing devastating tariffs on imported goods and then dangling the possibility of reducing the tariffs if foreign companies invest in the U.S.

In July, South Korea agreed to invest $350 billion in the U.S. in exchange for Trump lowering the duty on Korean products from 25 percent to 15 percent. The tariffs are paid by American companies, with the costs typically passed on to consumers.

The Hyundai plant arrests came just 10 days after South Korea’s new president, Lee Jae Myung, met Trump in Washington, D.C., where they both vowed to strengthen business ties between the two countries.

Following the Hyundai plant raid, South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs blasted the arrests, the Wall Street Journal reported.

“The economic activities of our companies investing in the United States and the interests of our citizens must not be unduly violated during the course of U.S. law enforcement,” a ministry spokesperson said in a statement.

The South Korean government has negotiated the release of its nationals and is chartering a plane to repatriate them, Reuters reported Monday.

The battery plant that was raided will be jointly operated by Hyundai and LG Energy Solution, a South Korean battery manufacturer, as part of a $12.6 billion investment in Georgia that also includes a nearby auto factory. In a statement, Hyundai told the Journal it didn’t directly employ anyone who was detained.

The raid was the largest worksite raid in the Department of Homeland Security’s history, and it highlighted that foreign companies are struggling to find qualified American workers, according to Reuters.

People in the Korean capital of Seoul were outraged by the operation’s optics, as footage of the raid showed armored vehicles and shackled workers.

Speaking to reporters over the weekend, Trump tried to downplay the impact the raid could have on bilateral relations with a key economic ally.

His Truth Social post also tried to strike a more conciliatory note after warning foreign companies to hire Americans.

“Together, we will all work hard to make our Nation not only productive, but closer in unity than ever before,” he wrote. “Thank you for your attention to this matter! DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.”

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The Guardian

Leaked Ice document shows worker detained in Hyundai raid had valid visa

At least one of the Korean workers swept up in a huge immigration raid on a Hyundai Motor factory site in Georgia last week was living and working legally in the US, according to an internal federal government document obtained by the Guardian.

Officials then “mandated” that he agree to be removed from the US despite not having violated his visa.

The document shows that immigration officials are aware that someone with a valid visa was among the people arrested during the raid at the Hyundai factory and taken to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) detention for removal proceedings, where the people arrested remained on Tuesday before expected deportation flights back to South Korea.

The document in question reports on the man’s case and was leaked exclusively to the Guardian. It was written by an Ice agent. The Guardian is redacting the identity of the man in question, who arrived in the US in June, because it has not been possible to reach him directly and it is unclear whether he has any legal representation.

The document says that immigration agents from Atlanta “determined that [redacted] entered into the United States in [redacted], with a valid B1/B2 visa and [redacted] was employed at HL-GA Battery Company LLC as a contractor from the South Korean company SFA. From statements made and queries in law enforcement databases, [redacted] has not violated his visa; however, the Atlanta Field Office Director has mandated [redacted] be presented as a Voluntary Departure. [Redacted] has accepted voluntary departure despite not violating his B1/B2 visa requirements.”

The internal file describes “an actual crime”, according to Charles Kuck, an immigration attorney based in Georgia – but with the crime allegedly being committed by the government, not the detainee in question. Kuck, who is representing a number of people arrested during last week’s raid, said it was illegal to detain a valid visa holder in this way.

“This is outrageous,” Kuck said.

The document contradicts claims by the agency that all 475 people arrested during the raid were working illegally or violating their visas. Attorneys scrambling in recent days to provide representation to the men detained had already claimed that immigrants with a valid working status were swept up alongside the people allegedly working unlawfully, and placed in removal proceedings. That view was backed up by an agency official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive government matters.

The arrest “is illegal”, the official claimed in an interview with the Guardian. The government maintains it is the detainee who acted unlawfully.

It is not yet clear whether other people with valid visas were detained in the raid, nor how many were actually alleged to be working illegally at the factory.

Approximately 300 people arrested could be put on flights back to South Korea as early as Wednesday, according to one source familiar with events who requested anonymity to speak about what is going on behind the scenes. Non-Koreans arrested during the operation are expected to remain in Ice detention.

Last Thursday, Ice led a raid at the Hyundai battery factory under construction in Ellabell, near Savannah, Georgia, and arrested nearly 500 people, the majority of whom were from South Korea, part of a $12.6bn investment program in Georgia by the company. Construction had to be halted on the plant that is designed to supply batteries for electric vehicles.

A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the federal parent agency of Ice, said in a statement to the Guardian that: “This individual admitted to unauthorized work on a B1/B2 visa. He was offered voluntary departure and accepted it,” despite this being the opposite of what the leaked document says. When pressed for further clarification, the DHS reiterated its first statement. Ice did not respond to a request for comment about legal workers being arrested.

“This is a clear violation of the law in detaining somebody who is not lawfully detainable,” Kuck said. “That’s a crime – that’s unlawful imprisonment in the United States. This isn’t an accident. People go to prison for stuff like this.”

According to the file written by an agent with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), an agency within Ice, the man entered the US “with a valid B1/B2 visa”, which allows for some business-related activities and tourism. He was at the Hyundai factory as a contractor with a South Korean company.

“‘ Voluntarily’ means something different in immigration than it does in the real world,” Kuck said. “When you basically leave under Ice custody, then you have immigration consequences that come with that, including the loss of visa and possibly an inability to return [to the US].”

After the raid, additional Ice officers and agents were sent to the detention facility to process the sheer number of people arrested, according to the agency official who spoke to the Guardian.

Although officials say that the people arrested were in some violation of immigration laws, many others with valid legal status were offered voluntary departure, the official claimed. The official added that it was unclear what would happen with any legal immigrants who refuse to be deported voluntarily, since there is “no legal mechanism to remove them if they are not in violation” of US civil immigration laws. There is no suggestion that the Korean man in question has a criminal record in the US.

“The arrest itself is illegal and this just might be a way of pushing up [arrest] numbers and covering up mistakes,” the official added.

The raid angered the South Korean government, which announced billions of dollars of investment in the US following a new trade deal between the countries. On Sunday, the South Korean and US governments negotiated a deal to take the arrested workers home.

“These workers were put in incredibly vulnerable positions,” said Samantha Hamilton, a litigation attorney with Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta. She emphasized that the men had ended up imperiled simply by taking up the opportunity of work on what was an ambitious international project.

The DHS and Ice did not respond to requests for comment on allegations that they are pressuring the detainees to agree to be deported.

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Opinion

Trump’s ICE Just Wrecked Massive Business Investment Deal for the U.S.
Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling
Wed, September 10, 2025

South Korean businesses have suspended at least 22 U.S. projects after an ICE raid on a Hyundai Motor factory site in Georgia detained hundreds of South Korean workers.

Some 475 employees, including 300 South Koreans, were taken into custody Thursday at the Savannah-area battery plant. Videos released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials showed the detained workers in shackles and chains. The raid shocked Seoul, a key U.S. ally, where people expressed a sense of betrayal by Washington.

The facility was part of a $4.3 billion joint venture that was slated for completion later this year. It was expected to create 8,500 jobs that would support the car company’s nearby electric vehicle plan, but construction on the factory was put on pause after the raid.

Work on at least 22 other factory sites with ties to South Korea has also been halted, reported The Korean Economic Daily. Those facilities are involved in industries related to automobiles, shipbuilding, steel, and electrical equipment.

South Korean companies with U.S. business interests have canceled travel plans and recalled their U.S.-based staff, fearing that their employees could be affected by more raids.

“Korean workers are being treated like criminals for building factories that Washington itself lobbied for,” a company executive in Seoul told the business newspaper. “If this continues, investment in the U.S. could be reconsidered.”

President Donald Trump defended the raid, claiming Friday that the employees were in the U.S. “illegally” and that U.S. companies needed to focus on training their American employees in order to do the jobs they would otherwise outsource.

An immigration attorney representing several of the detained South Koreans, Charles Kuck, told the Associated Press that the president’s statement wasn’t just wrong—as many of the workers were authorized to work under the B-1 business visitor visa program—but was basically unfeasible in the short term, as no U.S. companies make the machines utilized at the Georgia factory.

“They had to come from abroad to install or repair equipment on-site—work that would take about three to five years to train someone in the U.S. to do,” the AP reported.

Industry officials in Seoul have warned that the projects—collectively worth more than $101 billion—could face serious delays or be placed on indefinite hiatus unless Washington agrees to bilateral talks for new visa arrangements for South Korean employees.

The South Korean workers were expected to be released back to their home country on a chartered plane Wednesday afternoon, though the flight was reportedly delayed “due to circumstances on the U.S. side,” the South Korean Foreign Ministry told the BBC.