I worked construction in US (illegally). It’s not hard work. Boring but not hard. It’s not like agriculture where Americans show up and resign after one day. We had couple of Americans hired with us for legal reason and the main issue was that they sucked. They would finish some union training course and know some basic bricklaying for example but were unable to solve any issues when needed. They were like simple robots: able to follow simple instructions but unable to improvise. The guys from Eastern Europe and South America were used to figuring things out on the spot.
It’s different where it comes to more specialized professions like electricians or plumbers. I saw Americans doing this independently. When it comes to entry level jobs they sucked.
Construction workers (mostly immigrants) work super hard, and it’s not easy work. People destroy their bodies after working construction for several years. It’s literally called “hard labor.”
If you found it easy, that’s cool. But it’s pretty absurd to suggest that’s always the case.
The hardest thing I did was demolishing and old building. A lot of dust and rusty nails. I was careful and lucky enough no to hurt myself but some people did cut themselves or stepped on a nail. It took us couple of weeks to demolish the entire building. After that the construction itself was easy. It’s just 2x4 and pneumatic nail guns. When we were bricklaying I would have to carry the bricks for 1-2h a day. The rest of the day was filled with easier tasks. There was a forklift on site to move heavy things, concrete was pumped. There was nothing backbreaking. I worked at union sites and private projects. The days were long but it wasn’t that hard.
What’s your experience? What types of projects did you work on? What did you find the most difficult?
I don’t do the work personally, just witness it very often, so I’m only going by second hand info.
I’m sure it varies wildly by the type of job.
Well, I will keep my first hand opinion about it then.
Yeah can confirm Eastern Europeans are fantastic construction workers, they basically build everything in Western Europe along with a smaller proportion of Southern Americans.
Don’t worry, the childrent will be back to work there soon. Hyundai/Kias subsidiary companies/suppliers have a history of using child labor in the US.
Soooo much winning everywhere.
The Greatness… it staggers the mind!
The battery factory is part of Hyundai’s $12.6 billion investments in the state …., in what would be “the largest economic development project in the state’s history.”
“Would have been”, LoL
That’ll teach companies not to ever risk opening factories in the US…
Or thoroughly do the paperwork during the hiring process.
Yeah that’s the reason this happened. They just didn’t check applicants close enough 🙄
I m not seeing it.
I mean in both cases we have plenty of existing cases to be skeptical
-
corporations do skirt the rules so it’s easy to believe Hyundai had some of their people doing work in violation of their visas.
-
ICE is a stain on our ideas of justice and human rights, so I’ll always assume they’re in the wrong.
However even with these assumptions, how is this an arrestable offense? I’d expect levying fines against the corporation. All it takes is one lawyer. These are not criminals
how is this an arrestable offense?
Violation of visa/work permits isn’t an “arrestable offense”? What do you expect the government should do with those who stay and work in the country without valid documents?
Pull out a gun and start blasting? Do you really think it’s only a binary choice?
How about matching the severity of response to the infraction? As far as I know overstaying a visa has always been done through the judicial branch. More importantly if there are that many at a single company violating their visa restrictions, the company is the problem, not the individuals. An even better response might be legal action against the company. Either way these mass detentions are way out of proportion
Jaywalking isn’t an arrestable offense? What do you expect the government to do with those who flaunt traffic rules nonchalantly?
-
No, I think it goes a bit deeper than that.
-
the plant was still under construction, I bet they use a lot of contractors, and those contractors had workers who were undocumented, just like most construction contractors do.
-
but, there were a lot of South Korean nationals in the raid. Those folks didn’t come over to pour concrete. I bet there were a bunch of engineers and middle managers over from South Korea to train up staff. Those Korean nationals didn’t have work authorization, but didn’t need it because they were employees of the South Korean part of the business. ICE doesn’t care, though. They took them all.
Now, the Administration knows that they can raid just about any new construction and find people without work authorization. They targeted this particular one because it is in Georgia and Georgia didn’t “find enough votes” for Trump in 2020. But it will backfire, bigly, because not only will tourism continue to drop but international businesses with a presence in the US will stop sending their people here in business, for any reason. The Administration just added the costs of getting foreign nationals out of ICE detention to the cost of doing business in the US.
I auto-translated the Korean article on this because it has more detail.
https://n.news.naver.com/article/015/0005180971?sid=101
Sounds like the majority of people picked up were in fact Korean citizens working under false pretenses. They used b1 visas and ESTA (non-visa travel authorization) meant for things like personal travel or international meetings, but not productive work like constructing a new facility.
The fact that they were Korean insinuates that they weren’t doing run-of-the-mill construction tasks because that could be handled by local firms (who would probably be hiring local Latino workers): they were probably there for much more technical work.
Hyundai would have known this, and would have been intentionally breaking this law. This sounds to me a lot more like a big company actually getting consequences than what ice has been doing raiding small businesses and home depot parking lots.
were in fact Korean citizens working under false pretenses. They used b1 visas and ESTA (non-visa travel authorization) meant for things like personal travel or international meetings, but not productive work like constructing a new facility.
Do you happen to know for certain that b1 visas and ESTA does not cover “productive work like constructing a new facility”? Because I think you are wrong. (I am not an immigration lawyer, but I suspect you are not either).
I have worked for international companies, and got sent over for “productive work” in visa waiver countries, and nobody told me that I needed a visa for any of that. The main focus of immigration law is on making sure people are authorized to take a job in the US. If someone is employed outside the US and comes to the US on behalf of their employer, and not paid for their services by any US entity, then it doesn’t matter what they do, as long as they leave when they are supposed to.
And, in fact, with a casual Google search, I found that a B1 visa does not in fact prohibit those activities: https://www.boundless.com/immigration-resources/b-1-b-2-visitor-visa-explained. It explicitly allows them, for a short duration (but longer than the ETSA waiver would). That link also explicitly says Canadians do not need the B1 visa for short activities, because it is covered under the visa waivers. My guess is it would work the same for any country eligible for the ESTA.
In spite of all this, ICE detained them anyway, because rules don’t apply to them. They get to do whatever the hell they want, because the President hates foreigners. It’s that simple.
Im definitely not a lawyer, but here is a government link.
https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/tourism-visit/visitor.html
Permitted activities under b1 include
- Consult with business associates
- Attend a scientific, educational, professional, or business convention or conference
- Settle an estate
- Negotiate a contract
Not permitted include:
- Study
- Employment
- Paid performances, or any professional performance before a paying audience
- Arrival as a crewmember on a ship or aircraft
- Work as foreign press, in radio, film, print journalism, or other information media
- Permanent residence in the United States
Also on that official site, it says the permitted activities for visa-free (ESTA) are the same as B visas.
If someone is employed outside the US and comes to the US on behalf of their employer, and not paid for their services by any US entity, then it doesn’t matter what they do, as long as they leave when they are supposed to.
The US government actually doesn’t care who is paying for the work, what matters is if the work is taking place within the US, it requires a proper visa (or esta).
Consult with business associates
Overseeing the construction of a facility and training of staff would be covered.
This is a reminder that no company or nation should trust the US or invest in the US. International boycott, global embargo. It’s the only way.
-
The illegal part is how capitalism works, bud. It’s not the paperwork preventing slavery & poverty wages; it’s the exploitive system.
That’s the idea.
