The repatriation of hundreds of South Korean workers arrested in an immigration raid in the United States has been delayed, officials in Seoul said on Wednesday, as frustration and anger with the Trump administration here began to mount.
It was unclear when a chartered Korean Air flight, which was previously scheduled to fly from Atlanta on Wednesday, would take off. But the plane’s departure was delayed because of issues on the American side, the South Korean foreign ministry said, without elaborating.
Last week’s images of armed U.S. agents dragging away South Korean workers in handcuffs and ankle chains from a Hyundai-LG battery plant in Ellabell, Ga., outraged many in South Korea. Seoul has tried to prevent the raid from unsettling its decades-old alliance with Washington, a key to South Korea’s security. And it has scrambled to diffuse the tension by hurriedly negotiating the workers’ release and sending a plane to pick them up.
But the raid has been raising political hackles in a country where people are known to take to the streets in anti-U.S. protests when they feel their national pride has been slighted by the Americans.
In recent days, small groups of people have held rallies near the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, criticizing the way South Korean workers were treated.
“Why should we be treated like this when we are providing the United States with our technology, our money and our investments?” Kim Joon-hyung, an opposition lawmaker said during a parliamentary hearing on Monday.
Mr. Kim urged the government to tally all the Americans visiting South Korea on tourist visas and making money by teaching English. He said he suspected that their number could be in “thousands or tens of thousands.” He stopped short of asking the South Korean government to detain and deport them but asked: “Isn’t that illegal?”
On Wednesday, frustrated allies of President Lee Jae Myung spoke out.
Lee Eun-ju, a top member of the president’s governing Democratic Party, suggested that if necessary, South Korea would withdraw all its nationals working on investment projects in the United States and suspend all its investments, including factories under construction, until the safety of South Korean workers is guaranteed.
Ms. Lee said South Korea cherished its ties with the United States and respected the American-led international order. But there is a limit, she said.
“It’s just too much,” she said, referring to South Korean workers in shackles. The U.S. Embassy in Seoul did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Many of the South Korean detainees were being held at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in Folkston, Ga. The private prison is unclean, poorly run and unpleasant to be in, said Charles Kuck, an immigration lawyer based in Georgia who is representing 12 of the South Korean detainees.
“It is jail,” he said.
Han Jae Lee, a lawyer based in Seoul, said he received a message from his brother-in-law, a battery facility engineer, on Thursday saying that he was being investigated by I.C.E. Initially, Mr. Lee didn’t think much of the message, as his brother-in-law had been granted a B-2 visa before flying to the United States.
But when he turned on the news, Mr. Lee saw images of South Korean workers being arrested in Georgia, where his brother-in-law landed.
“Seeing my relative and his colleagues being taken away in handcuffs and ankle chains, as if the U.S. government was bragging about it, was terrifying,” he said. Mr. Lee said he still has not been able to contact his brother-in-law and criticized both governments for not being transparent.
“Our family still doesn’t know what law he violated and what he was arrested for,” he said. “What I want now is for him to return to Seoul as soon as possible.”
South Korea’s foreign minister, Cho Hyun, flew to Washington on Monday to secure the workers’ release and discuss ways of protecting other South Korean businesses from similar raids.
The detained workers had been working in Georgia to build an electric vehicle battery factory jointly owned by Hyundai and LG Energy Solution, both South Korean companies. It is one of dozens of factories South Korean manufacturing giants like Samsung, Hyundai, SK and LG have built or are building in the United States with the encouragement of both governments.
U.S. immigration officials said the South Koreans were working there illegally, undermining the chances of American citizens to find jobs.
Industry officials have said that many of the detained workers arrived in the United States with short-term business visas or under a visa waiver program.
That was the easiest way for South Korean businesses and subcontractors to bring in skilled workers because it is hard to find American workers experienced in building battery factories, or to secure long-term work visas for foreign workers under the Trump administration, according to South Korean officials, politicians and business executives.
Choe Sang-Hun is the lead reporter for The Times in Seoul, covering South and North Korea.
Jin Yu Young reports on South Korea, the Asia Pacific region and global breaking news from Seoul.
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