Lee Hyuk-jae, executive in charge of North America (vice president) at LG Energy Solution, said, after the arrests and detentions of employees at a joint battery plant in Georgia, United States, on the 4th (local time), "We are assessing the current situation at all business sites and doing our best to ensure there is no impact on customers."
According to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on the 16th, Lee made the remarks while speaking with reporters at the Automotive News Congress held in Detroit that day.
Lee said, "It is something many people already know, but after going through this crisis, our paying attention to this issue will bring good results," adding, "We hope that, taking this incident as an opportunity, visa issues will improve so that Korean workers with technical skills can enter the United States more easily."
However, Lee declined to comment on having directed employees working under the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) to return home, and also did not answer about the situation in which construction of the local plant is proceeding without any detainees having returned to Korea.
LG Energy Solution, in addition to the joint battery plant with Hyundai Motor that was raided, is building standalone plants in Queen Creek, Arizona, and Lansing, Michigan. The company is also constructing a battery plant jointly with Honda in Fayette County, Ohio. According to LG Energy Solution, construction of the Georgia plant, where the arrests and detentions occurred, has been halted, but construction of the other plants is ongoing.
Earlier, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under the Department of Homeland Security arrested and detained a total of 475 people at the construction site of the joint battery plant in Georgia, including 317 Koreans. Among them, 330 people—including 316 Koreans and 14 foreign nationals (10 from China, three from Japan, and one from Indonesia)—were detained for seven days at an ICE facility in Folkston, Georgia, and returned to Korea on the 12th.
The WSJ said, "According to the search warrant, the initial targets of the operation were four Hispanic workers," and added, "The incident highlighted that skilled personnel from Korean corporations are having difficulty obtaining the visas needed to enter the United States and start new manufacturing operations."