On Thursday, Georgia was the staging ground for the largest single site immigration raid in the history of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations wing.
In total, the operation at the Hyundai Metaplant campus near Savannah netted 475 arrests of immigrants working in the U.S. without authorization, the majority of whom were Korean nationals, authorities said.
Included among the people arrested on Thursday were immigrants who crossed the border illegally or overstayed visas — two groups who represent the pillars of the country’s population of unauthorized immigrants.
But Steven Schrank, special agent in charge of HSI Atlanta, said on Friday that a third group of people were swept up in this week’s raid: Workers who had entered the country through the Visa Waiver Program, which allows foreign nationals to travel to the U.S. without a visa.
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
Participation in the Visa Waiver Program offers citizens of European Union countries and select others, including South Korea, seamless access to the U.S. But rules limit the activities travelers can engage in during their time in the country.
In Georgia, South Korean travelers have attempted to abuse the Visa Waiver Program in the past.
What is the Visa Waiver Program?
The Visa Waiver Program gives travelers visa-free access to the U.S. for a period of 90 days, though participants must fill out an online questionnaire ahead of time known as the Electronic System for Travel Authorization.
“By virtue of being from their country of origin, they can just get in a plane and come to the U.S.,” said Luis Alemany, an immigration attorney based in Alpharetta.
Travel purposes covered by the Visa Waiver Program include tourism and some business activities, such as attending conferences, networking, or negotiating contracts. But employment is not allowed.
“A business visitor under the visa waiver can be in the United States on behalf of their employer doing meetings, giving trainings, doing things that aren’t necessarily productive labor. So, if they detained anybody like that (in Savannah), that was an improper detention,” said Charles Kuck, an Atlanta-area immigration attorney. “But those people, if they were working on the assembly line or in construction, they absolutely violated their status.”
People who entered the U.S. through the Visa Waiver Program cannot change their status and apply for work visas while in the country, Kuck added.
“It’s one of the many restrictions associated with the program,” he said.
What happens to violators?
Although they may spend some time in ICE detention, Visa Waiver Program travelers apprehended for violating the program’s rules are subject to quick deportation.
“They don’t even have to put you in front of an immigration judge,” Alemany said. “They can just issue something called an administrative order of removal, and with that piece of paper, they can put you on a plane and take you back to your country.”
For workers on the Hyundai campus who find themselves in that situation, being cleared to return to the U.S. will be unlikely.
Those individuals “will never be able to use the Visa Waiver Program again, and will likely never be able to get a U.S. visa again the rest of their lives,” Kuck said.
History of Visa Waiver Program abuse
In 2020, Customs and Border Protection officers working in Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport foiled what the agency described as “an intricate scheme by a large group of Korean nationals” to fraudulently work in Georgia despite seeking entrance into the country under the Visa Waiver Program.
Thirty-three Korean nationals were detained and deported. They intended to work at the SK Battery America plant in Commerce, but lacked proper visas. SK is a division of a Korean company.
A CBP investigation found that the travelers were planning to spend up to three months working at the battery plant, and earning $6,000 to $7,000.
The Visa Waiver Program passengers sought to “take jobs away from our hard working citizens,” then-CBP Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan said.
The accumulation of episodes of Visa Waiver Program abuse involving Korean nationals will likely expose travelers from South Korea to increased scrutiny at U.S. airports.
“They look for patterns of violations to tailor their enforcement,” Alemany said. “Because they know that they’re not going to catch everybody. So, they have to prioritize their resources. I would 100% think that, after this happened, Koreans should expect to get put through the grinder.”
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