The fallout from the ICE raid in Georgia continues

As if the news couldn’t get any worse for electric vehicle manufacturers in the United States, it is now being reported that the fallout from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is worse than originally reported.

The Tennessean is reporting that General Motors’ Spring Hill operation has lost its Korean employees after the Georgia Raid. That facility was a joint venture valued at $2.3 billion USD with LG Energy Solutions to build low-cost lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries on site.

Like the LGES facility in Georgia, the one in Spring Hill would produce the batteries on site for production at the nearby automotive assembly plant. GM’s Spring Hill plant currently makes the Cadillac Lyriq, Cadillac Vistiq, Honda Prologue, and Acura ZDX.

While those vehicles use lithium-ion NCMA chemistry batteries, and shouldn’t see production of new vehicles harmed by this loss, the slowdown of that plant’s assembly could delay the introduction of cheaper batteries to help lower the cost of new EVs, including volume vehicles needed to grow adoption.

Now that the workers who were detained by the ICE raid have returned to South Korea, they are starting to speak out to the media. And what they are saying is objectively not good.

In an editorial titled “The tyranny of the empire, the humiliation of Korea,” translated from Korean, describes from the Korean perspective of the “barbaric act of chaining the bodies and hands of our workers.” Yikes.

The piece goes on to describe the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement as “white and evangelical forces to bring America back to the era before civil rights.” It continues to not mince words, describing Trump’s supporters as “low-income and low-educated whites.”

It gets worse, and I encourage you all to read it to better understand how upset the Korean people are at what happened.

That same publication has also published accounts from people who were detained by the U.S. government.

The lack of privacy was also a problem for the women. “It was a situation where human rights were not guaranteed, especially in the phenomenon of menstruation,” said a worker.

Lee Sung-hoon, vice president of the Korean Human Rights Association, told the publication that, “If you look at the testimony so far, such as the enforcement of taking in dozens of people in one shot and providing poor toilets and food, there are many parts that do not meet the international standards for the treatment of detainees.”

There have been other reports about the treatment of detainees awaiting deportation, and the conditions in which they have to live. It seems that the Koreans were treated to the same, or worse, treatment.

In another article from the same publication, other workers were interviewed about their detainment in the United States. Someone going by the name of Mr. A. asked about why he was detained, since he came in with a legitimate B-1 visa.

The agent he asked replied, “I don’t know and the people above think it’s illegal.”

During Mr. A.’s interview, agents questioned why he was in the United States, if he was Korean, and even made reference to “Rocketman” (that’s the nickname President Trump has given the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un), and “North Korea,” making a reference to the country across the Demilitarized Zone to the North of Seoul.

Detainees were concerned about signing documentation, but did so because the agents were armed. The Consulate General met with detainees on the fourth day of detention, who were told to “sign unconditionally for what you are asked to sign here.”

Mr. A. was angry because he was here on a B-1 visa and didn’t understand why he was being treated the way he was.

According to Bloomberg, the United States Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau expressed regret over the detention of the Korean workers. He was in Seoul for a formal meeting and said that those workers would “face no disadvantage” when re-entering the United States.

The publication also reports that despite the free trade agreement with the United States, South Korea was never given a specific, dedicated visa quota, which makes it frustrating to know if there are too many workers in the United States or not.

Based on the treatment they experienced in the hands of the government, many of the workers who returned to Korea said that they have no interest in ever returning to the United States. With the fallout spreading to other Korean facilities in the country, the action could seriously jeopardize the significant financial investments the companies from South Korea have pledged to spend in the United States.