Immigration Raid At Hyundai Plant Construction Site Results in Hundreds of Arrests UPDATED

by Chris Teague

Published: September 5th, 2025

immigration raid at hyundai plant construction site results in hundreds of arrests

Updated at 3:00 p.m. ET with new information on the arrested individuals.

Immigration officials descended on Hyundai’s factory in Georgia yesterday, arresting hundreds of people at the production facility. Agents from the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, DEA, and Georgia State Patrol arrested around 450 people they say were in the country illegally.

The raid picked up executives and others from South Korean battery manufacturer LG Energy Solution, which is a co-owner of the facility with Hyundai. Neither company confirmed the number of people that were arrested, but the development raised alarm bells in South Korea. A spokesperson for the country’s Foreign Ministry said, “The economic activities of our investment companies and the rights and interests of our citizens must not be unjustly violated during U.S. law enforcement proceedings.” LG said it was working with Hyundai and its home government to get the arrested employees released.

Steven Schrank, special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations Atlanta, said, “We are making many arrests of undocumented individuals. We have encountered many lawful employees working here, United States citizens and lawful permanent residents, and they are of course being released.” The Hyundai facility sprawls across 3,000 acres and employs around 1,200 people.

A Hyundai spokesperson said there was no impact to the plant or production. The arrests happened at the automaker’s battery plant construction site, not on a factory floor, and the automaker said it was “cooperating fully with the appropriate authorities regarding activity at our construction site.” Construction on the new facility has been paused while the situation progresses.

Videos of the event show agents in masks approaching, saying, “We’re Homeland Security. We have a search warrant for the whole site. We need construction to cease immediately. We need all work to end on the site right now.” The raid is one of many that have happened over the last few months but is one of the largest to date.

[Images: Hyundai]

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Chris Teague

Chris grew up in, under, and around cars, but took the long way around to becoming an automotive writer. After a career in technology consulting and a trip through business school, Chris began writing about the automotive industry as a way to reconnect with his passion and get behind the wheel of a new car every week. He focuses on taking complex industry stories and making them digestible by any reader. Just don’t expect him to stay away from high-mileage Porsches.

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6 of 134 comments

Cap65775250 on Sep 08, 2025

"Visible minority" is a Canadian thing, I think. In the US Elon Musk is African American since he was born and raised in Africa. Under American law that makes him ineligible to run for president.

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Jalop1991 on Sep 08, 2025

ICE raid on Hyundai battery plant resulted in arrest of 300 Korean nationals

ICE agents detained 450 illegal migrants at a construction site in Georgia, including hundreds of fly-in Koreans who likely misused B-1/B-2 business tourist visas to take jobs from American construction workers ...
Hyundai 'is a repeat offender,' Jay Palmer, an immigration expert who works with immigration lawyers, told Breitbart News. Like other companies, including Mercedes, Kia, and Tesla, Hyundai executives use staffing companies to legally shield themselves as they fly airport migrants to job sites, he said...

These battery plants received massive tax incentives from state governments. Even Republican politicians boasted about them, talking about American jobs and economic prosperity.
Hyundai seemingly repaid that by hiring illegal Korean workers.

More:

'They push the people [job applicants] to staffing agencies, and then they hire them from staffing agencies, and then think they're shielded by the law because they have a master service agreement that states [immigration status] is not their responsibility. This is happening in every industry, especially in meat processing plants …It's just egregious,' Palmer explained.
The airport migrants are just basic economics for the CEOs, he said. 'Why hire an American worker that might be unionized and you have to pay them $20, $25, $30 an hour, when you can hire a foreign worker and pay them $5, $6, $7, $8 an hour, and you don't have to pay insurance on them?'

And even more on Twitter:

Branum said she called ICE after Korean workers came to her and others, explaining they were living like 20 to a house with no money. If true, Hyundai should face serious penalties for paying skilled labor just $20k a year.

I love this quote:

If this rumor is true, and if you've lived in places near immigrants you know it's possible, this seems almost indistinguishable from slave labor and trafficking.

Go on, buy your H/K/G cars and tell me you're not part of the problem.

1 Reply
- See 3 previous
- Bd2 on Sep 08, 2025
  
  Oh great Breitbart. Care to post some mother jones too?
  
  Like
- Jalop1991 on Sep 08, 2025
  
  I noticed you completely ignored the Twitter bit. Whassa matter, can't handle the truth?
  As for your Breitbart comment: I follow the news wherever it takes me. Apparently you don't. Apparently you follow only the Party-approved news sources.
  Facts matter. Breitbart did actual reporting. You're just upset that there are non-Party-approved news outlets out there to pollute the minds of the proletariat.
  Go on, buy your H/K/G cars and tell me you're not part of the problem.
  
  Like
- Jalop1991 on Sep 08, 2025
  
  Bd2, how's this. CNN is worried about the local grocer losing business.
  Oh--and about being a mouthpiece for South Korea. Anything anti-American goes with CNN. To wit:
  Connections between the plant and surrounding communities are only in the early stages. But local Korean leaders stressed many of those caught in the sweep were skilled technicians who had helped stand up similar facilities in South Korea and elsewhere.
  
  James Rim, president of the Korean American Association of Southeast Georgia, is a builder who has hosted such workers at Airbnbs. Many, he emphasized, are single men without children in the area, but they bring specialized expertise in machinery and factory systems hard to find in the US.
  yes, listen to the Korean mouthpieces try to gaslight us into believing that there is zero US knowledge to build such factory systems. No, we need to bring in only the Koreans. Didn't we hear this same story long ago when the Japanese came in?
  Rim suggested the government should distinguish between those with criminal records and those whose only violation is a visa overstay or mismatch, and consider letting the latter remain, pay taxes and potentially seek green cards.
  In other words, we will tell you what of your laws you should follow. Hey, Rim: those who overstayed their visas are criminals, now with a record. Thanks, but we don't need any help telling us how our laws work.
  Or, better yet South Korea, why don't you match your behavior with what you demand of us? You know, just let your strict immigration laws go.
  In Tom Clancy's book Debt of Honor, he had the US propose that we mirror Japanese trade practices--and he outlined the Japanese as claiming that was "unfair". We are seeing this very situation right now with South Korea.
  Anyway, CNN isn't at all worried about America. Communist News Network indeed.
  
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- EBFlex on Sep 08, 2025
  
  Great post Jalop. Liberals are a cancer on society.
  
  2
- Bd2 on Sep 09, 2025
  
  ^^^ANAL
  Most of those arrested are highly skilled workers re battery manufacturing (which the US does not have expertise or enough of them).; you think TSMC build of a new foundry in AZ doesn't have mostly Taiwanese workers for skilled positions?
  Nothing more than the typical public grandstanding; why not work with these companies to expedite processing H-1B visas (with all the cuts in staffing, there's a huge backlog, as there is to get a new passport, etc., never mind trying to get an appointment with your local social security office).
  But as tyoical, this corrupt admin rather ramp up their base as support has been falling (leading group for job losses - white males due in large part to loss in manufacturing jobs; with American farmers even worse off than the 1st time around with Iowa's GDP shrinking by more than 6% and 1/3rd of Arkansas farmers facing bankruptcy).
  This will not only delay the opening of this and other plants by foreign companies (which provide jobs for Americans), but will put a damper on future investment.
  The irony in all this is that the Mango Mussolini, imported Polish workers (who worked and lived in substandard conditions) to do the demo for tRump Tower and both tRump projects in Vegas and Chicago used Chinese steel and aluminum.
  Maybe we should retroactively deport Melania and Elon as they both worked while on a tourist/student visa?
  
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