On September 4, 2025, the quiet rural landscape of Ellabell, Georgia, was upended as nearly 500 federal, state, and local officers swarmed the construction site of the HL-GA Battery Company, a joint venture between Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution. The site—sprawling across almost 3,000 acres and hailed as a linchpin of Georgia’s economic future—became the stage for one of the largest immigration raids in recent U.S. history. By day’s end, 475 workers, more than 300 of them South Korean nationals, had been detained, and construction ground to a halt.
The raid, carried out by agents from the Department of Homeland Security, FBI, Drug Enforcement Agency, and Georgia State Patrol, was part of a broader immigration crackdown championed by President Donald Trump in his second term. According to USA TODAY, agents executed a judicial search warrant tied to an ongoing investigation into alleged unlawful employment practices and other federal crimes at the battery plant construction site. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives announced the operation publicly, but details about the specific charges faced by those detained remained scarce.
Images released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and reported by the Associated Press showed workers shackled at the wrists, ankles, and waists—an image that reverberated across the Pacific, causing shock and a sense of betrayal in South Korea, a key U.S. ally. The majority of those detained were skilled technicians and specialists brought in to help launch the facility, which is expected to create 8,500 jobs by 2030 and transform the local economy. Yet, as CNN reported, the current workforce was largely composed of transient, single men on temporary visas or contracts, not yet the settled families that have been at the heart of other communities rocked by immigration enforcement.
President Trump was unapologetic in his response, stating, “The workers were here illegally,” and emphasizing the need for arrangements with countries like South Korea to bring in experts only to train U.S. citizens. U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, speaking in London, reinforced this stance, telling reporters, “His message today that he sent to the world was, ‘Listen, our laws will be enforced, and we’re encouraging all companies who want to come to the United States and help our economy and employ people, that we encourage them to employ U.S. citizens and to bring people to our country that want to follow our laws and work here the right way.’”
The fallout in South Korea was immediate and intense. Lawmakers from both governing and opposition parties condemned the raid. Cho Jeongsik, a lawmaker from the Democratic Party, questioned, “If U.S. authorities detain hundreds of Koreans in this manner, almost like a military operation, how can South Korean companies investing in the U.S. continue to invest properly in the future?” Kim Gi-hyeon, from the conservative People Power Party, called it an “unacceptable” act that dealt South Korea “a severe blow that will be difficult to heal.” Some even suggested reciprocal investigations into Americans working in South Korea without proper documentation.
Despite the outrage, most experts and officials acknowledged that South Korea was unlikely to retaliate in any significant way, given its deep security and economic ties with the U.S.—especially in the face of North Korean threats. Still, the raid came at a particularly sensitive moment: just weeks after South Korea pledged hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. investments as part of a tariff deal, and days after President Trump and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung held their first summit in Washington.
Paik Wooyeal, a professor at Yonsei University, told the Associated Press that the U.S. push to restore domestic manufacturing through foreign investment is clashing with visa and immigration systems ill-equipped to support such efforts. South Korean companies have been forced to rely on short-term visitor visas or the Electronic System for Travel Authorization to bring in the workers necessary to set up advanced manufacturing facilities. The result, as reported by South Korea’s Eugene Investment & Securities, is a looming shortage of skilled labor, rising costs, and potential delays to major business projects—like the battery plant, which was slated to begin production in early 2026.
Hyundai spokesperson Bianca Johnson assured that the raid did not impact the main metaplant’s production, and the company was cooperating fully with authorities. Construction at the HL-GA Battery Company, however, was paused to assist law enforcement, according to company spokesperson Mary Beth Kennedy. Local businesses felt the shock almost immediately. Sammie Rentz, owner of the Viet Huong Supermarket in Ellabell, told CNN that his Korean customer base “plummeted overnight.” He recounted, “Without the Koreans, I’m not making any money.” The ripple effect was clear: the rhythms of daily life, from morning ice cream runs to bustling work crews, vanished in an instant.
Community reactions were mixed and often muted. Many locals seemed hesitant to discuss the raid, wary of the tensions it exposed. At the same time, Korean American leaders like James Rim, president of the Korean American Association of Southeast Georgia, emphasized that many of the detained workers were specialists whose expertise is hard to find in the U.S. Rim argued for a more nuanced approach to immigration enforcement: “We just want … to make sure they are legally handled right. To make sure they are respected.”
As families in both Korea and Georgia scrambled to locate loved ones, frustration ran high. James Woo, communications director for Asian Americans Advancing Justice–Atlanta, told CNN, “Frustration and distress are very high, and despite guidance from different sources, families continue to struggle with communication and access.”
The anger spilled into the open on Saturday, when dozens of protesters gathered outside the Hyundai megasite, waving signs and chanting in both English and Korean. One protester, who identified himself only as Kim, declared, “On Thursday, 500 workers from the factory behind me were kidnapped by ICE … that is about half of them.” He called for solidarity among American workers and an end to mass deportations, claiming, “They are attacking the immigrants to attack the entirety of the working class in America. They’re trying to scare us.”
For now, the $7.6 billion Hyundai–LG project remains frozen, its promise of 8,500 jobs hanging in the balance. Hyundai insists none of the detained were direct employees, and the company has launched an internal investigation into its contractors’ practices. LG Energy Solution, meanwhile, has suspended most U.S. business trips and is pushing for the prompt release of detained workers. Federal officials have stated that their probe is focused on “unlawful employment practices and other serious federal crimes,” but no charges have been announced against the companies involved.
South Korea’s government has secured an agreement for the release of its detained citizens, who will be flown home on a charter flight once administrative steps are complete. Foreign Minister Cho Hyun, before departing for the U.S. to finalize the arrangements, told lawmakers that the U.S. had “not responded adequately” to requests for expanded work visas and vowed to use this incident to push for progress in negotiations.
In Ellabell, the future of the Hyundai–LG battery plant—and the broader promise of economic transformation—remains uncertain. The raid exposed not only the fragility of ambitious investment projects but also the deep divides and unresolved questions at the heart of America’s immigration and labor policies.
