The Reuters report explains just who these South Koreans involved actually were.
Workers say Korea Inc was warned about questionable US visas before Hyundai raid
from within the article:
"
Many of the people arrested were skilled workers who were sent to the U.S. to install equipment at the near-complete factory on a visa waver programme, or B-1 business traveller visas, which largely did not allow work, three people said.
"It's extremely difficult to get an H-1B visa, which is needed for the battery engineers. That's why some people got B-1 visas or ESTA," said Park Tae-sung, vice chairman of Korea Battery Industry Association, referring to the Electronic System for Travel Authorization.
One person who works at the Georgia site told Reuters that this had long been a routine practice. "There was a red flag ... They bypass the law and come to work," the person said, asking not to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter."
Unfortunately most of these South Koreans are the specialists that are helping get this factory ready to go.
They are NOT replacing American workers, these are the specialists and engineers who are the only people in the world who know what they are doing
And they are trying to help the USA get one of their special factories up and running.
Among them are the very people that are supposed to HELP TRAIN AMERICAN WORKERS to do this type of work.
The factory is NOT YET BUILT!
Good luck finishing it, if the very people needed to finish it and train the American workers are either unwilling to come back or unable because if they are slapped with a note saying they were deported, they can't come back.
This is why South Korea is trying to bend over backwards to get them home voluntarily- so they are just noted as voluntarily leaving. Otherwise they are never going to be able to get a visa, any visa to the US ever again.
It's a Rush Job to please Trump
I was listening to their side of things yesterday, and one of the things the South Koreans are trying to understand is why they are being punished for putting this factory on a RUSH JOB status.
Trying to get this factory up and running FAST to accommodate Trump and please him.
In order to get it done on time, they were using the B-1 Visas, not waiting for the rare H-1B Visas which would allow for this type of work.
The people who screwed up are the ones issuing the Visas, who weren't issuing the correct ones in the right amounts for this foreign owned factory company who is doing the USA a HUGE favour by training AMERICANS to be their competition!
Somebody in that dept (and I think that is a branch of the border security people under Kristi Noem) who couldn't figure out what Trump was doing and issue papers accordingly is the one that needs looking at.
I have no doubt that the sub contractors that were doing the ordinary building and hired illegal migrants were fully aware and didn't care. So I'm NOT SAYING that all of these workers are innocent.
But the specialist engineers and technicians who were there to install the delicate and specialized equipment, then train American workers are NOT the ones at fault.
They were issued the incorrect visas- because the correct ones would take too long. And that is a cultural misunderstanding. South Korea thought they could cut that corner and save time and that would please Trump and the American people would have their factory up and running by January! With American workers hired and trained and ready.
Lastly these people weren't living here- they were being given accommodations by Hyundai and LG, their families were at home in South Korea, where they have lives, where their paycheques land and where they work.
They and their families are in shock. I was watching some news out of South Korea. This has been a disaster.
The plant will likely not finish on time but to give Hyundai and LG their due, they are going to try again to get these people back in but with the right papers. Hopefully Trump persuades the bureaucrats involved to get off their office chairs and do just that.
That is why that plane is taking them home "voluntarily" so they don't have an automatic rejection on any future Visas
If THAT should happen, then either kiss that factory and it's American jobs goodbye permanently or wait till a new crop of specialists and engineers gets the expertise to help make it happen.
Meanwhile seeing their friends and relatives in chains is not helping US South Korean relations at all. This is insults on top of injury to them.
NO good deed goes unpunished- supposedly an ancient Chinese proverb. They thought they were doing a good deed to America, get that factory done by January, get those workers on the production line by January. Look great in the eyes of the world. South Korea getting it done for their friends in America!
Instead they were paraded in chains for the whole world to see.
This is not going well
