A Korean-American leader has described a “feeling of betrayal” following the high-profile workplace attack on South Korean automaker Hyundai.
Immigration raid at Hyundai Motor factory has lasting impact on Korean business
Daniel Lee, owner of 92 Chicken in Pooler, Ga., has been underperforming since the September immigration raid on his HL-GA battery company.
POOLER, Ga. – Daniel Lee’s fried chicken, with its spicy-sweet glaze, regularly drew hungry Korean workers from the nearby Hyundai plant to his 92 Chicken restaurant.
That was until two months ago, when a large-scale migrant raid on a battery factory stunned Mr Lee and disrupted his business. Federal agents handcuffed, chained and detained more than 300 Korean workers in the operation, which President Donald Trump later said was completely opposed.
The workers were flown home after several days in immigration detention, but the effects of the raid continue to reverberate from Lee’s restaurant table to Hyundai’s headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, to President Trump’s White House.
A high-profile raid on a major global Fortune 500 company that was actively recruiting in Georgia outraged many Korean Americans. According to Pew Research, approximately 1.8 million people in the United States trace their roots to South Korea. South Korea is a country that has long considered itself on par with the United States.
And that has raised existential questions for Lee’s business and for Korean Americans across the country who never imagined that people here would be legally targeted by ICE or that the Trump administration would take on a country that has invested billions of dollars into the U.S. economy.
Mr. Lee, who was born in Philadelphia to Korean parents, worked for Hyundai for 15 years before starting the restaurant, one of more than a dozen that opened in the Savannah suburb to serve Korean and Korean-American factory workers.
“I thought of America as my home country and Korea as my father’s country,” Lee said. “That’s why it seems like my parents are fighting.”
Biggest raid in ICE history
Charles Cook, an Atlanta-based immigration attorney who represented more than a dozen workers, said the majority of the 300 Korean workers were here legally on B-1 visas or visa waivers, allowing them to install equipment and train American workers.
But Reuters reported that some workers were concerned that their visas would not allow them to do their assigned work, given increased enforcement under the Trump administration.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement raided a factory based on warrants targeting four Hispanic workers suspected of being in the United States illegally. They detained 475 people there on September 4, in what authorities initially touted as the largest single-facility raid in ICE history.
According to a warrant obtained by USA TODAY, ICE received permission from a judge to search the factory for records related to the employment and residence of undocumented immigrants. Prosecutors have not yet filed criminal charges in connection with the raid, according to a review of federal court records.
“ICE knew they had failed,” Cook said. “Within 24 hours, ICE stopped talking to the press about the largest raid in history. It’s definitely still upsetting the companies because we’re hearing that none of the[workers]want to come back.”
Hyundai Motor Group’s Metaplant America is the company’s first mass-production electric vehicle plant, and is scheduled to produce 500,000 vehicles a year. The $8 billion campus is expected to create 8,500 jobs in the region.
The raid specifically targeted the Hyundai-LG Energy Solutions partnership, a factory under construction to manufacture EV batteries for Hyundai’s Ioniq 5 and Ioniq 9 electric SUVs.
The plant was scheduled to be operational by early 2026, but the arrests of hundreds of workers will delay operations by at least two to three months, Hyundai CEO Jose Muñoz said.
In late October, President Trump traveled to Asia to try to negotiate new trade deals and mend fences with South Korea. On the way, President Trump said from Air Force One that he was “very opposed” to the Hyundai attack.
“Some of these factories are making very complex, very sophisticated equipment,” he told reporters. “They have to take people in for a period of time.”
After the raid, President Trump offered to let the workers stay in the United States, but only one accepted.
Long-standing strategic relationship
There are good reasons why President Trump wants to smooth relations with South Korea. Decades of business and cultural ties are at risk, along with billions of dollars in investment and tens of thousands of jobs.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, South Korea ranks as the U.S.’s 8th largest trading partner.
“South Korea has become a global power over the last 20 to 30 years,” said Chris Su, an associate professor of history at Emory University in Atlanta. “Korean Americans feel that Korea has finally succeeded.”
Seoul-based Hyundai Motors was keen to demonstrate its commitment to the United States despite the attack.
This year, Hyundai held its annual investor conference outside South Korea for the first time, choosing New York.
Muñoz opened Hyundai’s September investor day with a message of “heartfelt sympathy” for the detained workers. He highlighted the company’s investment and called on the United States and South Korea to “work on mutually beneficial solutions” for foreign workers.
“Hyundai has been a part of America for nearly 40 years and has been operating in Georgia for more than 15 years,” he told investors, adding that the new battery plant “will bring long-term economic benefits to thousands of families and help transform the region.”
Mark Keim, director of the Korean American Association, said that’s part of the reason why the interrogation and arrest of hundreds of workers who appeared to be of Asian descent was disheartening to many Korean Americans.
“To say there is a sense of betrayal is an understatement,” he said.
Mr. Keim is a naturalized American and has lived in the United States for 45 years, serving as a state representative from Virginia and working in the Biden and Clinton administrations. Korean Americans, like other Asian Americans, often suffer from what he calls “permanent foreigner syndrome,” the creeping feeling that no matter their nationality or background, they will always be perceived as foreign by other Americans.
Keim, who travels across the country on assignment and recently visited Seattle, Chicago and New York City, said the raids “triggered concerns that were just below the surface.” “Everywhere I was with Korean-American people, that was the biggest topic of conversation.”
Business performance “has not recovered at all”
The tables at the Lee’s 92 Chicken franchise are now more empty than they were before the attack. Lee estimates he lost a fifth of his business as a result.
“It’s decreased dramatically,” Lee said. “I haven’t recovered at all.”
The city of Pooler is located between the artistic savannah and the rural Erabel and is where Hyundai has built its Metaplant campus. This fast-growing suburb spans approximately 30 square miles and is experiencing a surge in traffic and development.
“Being in the midst of Pooler and seeing all this growth, I went from being the only Korean woman there to now going to Costco and Publix and having my voice heard,” said Kay Heritage, a longtime Korean-American resident and owner of Big Bon Bodega Restaurant in Pooler. The restaurant offers pizza topped with Korean kimchi pickles.
As Koreans and Korean Americans flocked to the suburbs, new restaurants serving them flourished, as did other businesses, from estheticians and physical therapists to grocery stores and real estate agents, she said.
The community was hit hard by losing so many Koreans at once.
“Korean restaurants especially felt the impact,” she says.
Suh, a professor at Emory University, said the modern campus promises a continued flow of talent and capital from South Korea.
“If they stop coming or are reluctant to come, that means less business, less people participating in the Korean American community, less people going to church and buying food,” he said. “I think it’s going to take a while for people to feel the same way they did before the attack.”
In the restaurant’s kitchen, Lee makes Korean-style fried chicken by coating thighs and drumsticks with batter, slathering them with garlic, sweet chili or spicy gochujang sauce, and topping them with green onions. He keeps plastic gloves on the table for customers who don’t want to make a mess.
Lee said he is currently revamping the menu, trying to emulate Southern recipes and give fried chicken an American twist.
“Locals like things a little more salty and a little sweeter,” Lee says. “We have to make the menu a little less spicy.”
He’s not angry about the attack, he said. But he is determined.
“Decision makers can’t do anything,” he said. “We need to diversify our menu.”
Lauren Villagran covers immigration for USA TODAY. Contact him at lvillagran@usatoday.com.
Savannah Morning News Distolycin report from Pooler, Georgia.
Contributor: Trevor Hughes
