Trump’s ICE Just Wrecked Massive Business Investment Deal for the U.S.

South Korean businesses have suspended at least 22 U.S. projects after an ICE raid on a Hyundai Motor factory site in Georgia detained hundreds of South Korean workers.

Some 475 employees, including 300 South Koreans, were taken into custody Thursday at the Savannah-area battery plant. Videos released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials showed the detained workers in shackles and chains. The raid shocked Seoul, a key U.S. ally, where people expressed a sense of betrayal by Washington.

The facility was part of a $4.3 billion joint venture that was slated for completion later this year. It was expected to create 8,500 jobs that would support the car company’s nearby electric vehicle plan, but construction on the factory was put on pause after the raid.

Work on at least 22 other factory sites with ties to South Korea has also been halted, reported The Korean Economic Daily. Those facilities are involved in industries related to automobiles, shipbuilding, steel, and electrical equipment.

South Korean companies with U.S. business interests have canceled travel plans and recalled their U.S.-based staff, fearing that their employees could be affected by more raids.

“Korean workers are being treated like criminals for building factories that Washington itself lobbied for,” a company executive in Seoul told the business newspaper. “If this continues, investment in the U.S. could be reconsidered.”

President Donald Trump defended the raid, claiming Friday that the employees were in the U.S. “illegally” and that U.S. companies needed to focus on training their American employees in order to do the jobs they would otherwise outsource.

An immigration attorney representing several of the detained South Koreans, Charles Kuck, told the Associated Press that the president’s statement wasn’t just wrong—as many of the workers were authorized to work under the B-1 business visitor visa program—but was basically unfeasible in the short term, as no U.S. companies make the machines utilized at the Georgia factory.

“They had to come from abroad to install or repair equipment on-site—work that would take about three to five years to train someone in the U.S. to do,” the AP reported.

Industry officials in Seoul have warned that the projects—collectively worth more than $101 billion—could face serious delays or be placed on indefinite hiatus unless Washington agrees to bilateral talks for new visa arrangements for South Korean employees.

The South Korean workers were expected to be released back to their home country on a chartered plane Wednesday afternoon, though the flight was reportedly delayed “due to circumstances on the U.S. side,” the South Korean Foreign Ministry told the BBC.

A new report from the Center for American Progress projects that the Trump administration’s economic policies will leave all but the wealthiest Americans worse off financially.

According to the nonpartisan policy institute, by 2027, Trump’s tariffs and policies under his so-called One, Big, Beautiful Bill will have decreased the incomes of all but the top 1 percent of American households—which will be $5,000 richer, per the report.

Meanwhile, the 90–99 percent will lose about $675 and the bottom 20 percent will be $1,650 poorer. Groups in between will see losses ranging from $1,300 to $1,800.

But four years from now, the situation will reportedly be even more dire.

By 2029, “Americans at all income levels will have lighter pocketbooks, on average, than they would under a scenario in which the Trump administration’s policies were never implemented.” Even the incomes of the top 1 percent are projected to be $2,647 lower, with income groups within the other 99 percent of Americans suffering losses between $1,920 and $3,356.

While the administration touts its economic policies as major wins for the working and middle class, the “Trump effect” is apparently poised to benefit only the wealthiest Americans—and, even then, just in the short term.

FBI Director Kash Patel is being sued by three ousted federal agents, who allege he was instructed to remove any employee who’d previously investigated President Donald Trump.

The lawsuit comes from former Special Agents Steven Jensen, Spencer Evans, and Brian Driscoll, an 18-year agent who was accidentally appointed acting director of the FBI at the beginning of Trump’s second term. Before he was fired in August, Driscoll had resisted the president’s efforts to excise employees.

In a 68-page filing Wednesday, the trio alleged that their removals were unlawful, that Patel “deliberately chose to prioritize politicizing the FBI over protecting the American people,” and that he “degraded the country’s national security by firing three of the FBI’s most experienced operational leaders.”

The suit alleged that Patel told Driscoll that top officials at the White House and Department of Justice had “directed him to fire anyone who they identified as having worked on a criminal investigation against President Donald J. Trump.” Failure to do so would ensure Patel’s head was put on the chopping block next.

The suit also contained disturbing details from Driscoll’s vetting process in the early months of Trump’s second term, suggesting that the president’s team was taking unconstitutional efforts to target workers based on their politics.

Patel allegedly called Driscoll and told him that he should anticipate a vetting call from the presidential transition team. Patel told Driscoll “that as long as [he] was not prolific on social media, did not donate to the Democratic Party, and did not vote for Kamala Harris in the 2024 election, the ‘vetting’ would not be an issue.”

Soon after, Driscoll received a vetting call from Paul Ingrassia, a 28-year-old lawyer Trump nominated to run the Office of Special Counsel. (Ingrassia’s confirmation hearing was postponed in July after widespread concern over his lack of experience and ties to neo-Nazis.)

Driscoll alleges that Ingrassia asked him who he had voted for in 2024, as well as the previous five elections. Driscoll was also asked when he started to support Trump. He said he refused to answer the questions.

According to the lawsuit, he was asked other questions to reveal his stance on Trump’s various legal vendettas, such as whether the federal agents who raided Mar-a-Lago should be “held accountable,” and about his views on diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The lawsuit also lists Attorney General Pam Bondi, the FBI, the DOJ, and the entire executive branch as defendants. The lawsuit alleges that the trio’s firing was illegal, violating their First Amendment rights by ousting them for their perceived political affiliations, and Fifth Amendment rights by ruining their professional reputations.

Charlie Kirk, conservative activist and founder of conservative youth organization Turning Point USA, was reportedly shot Wednesday at an event in Utah.

Witnesses at Utah Valley University in Orem reported seeing Kirk get shot in the neck during a Q&A with students. Kirk was scheduled to appear at a “Prove Me Wrong Table” at the university as part of his American Comeback Tour.

Kirk has built a career off of traveling to college campuses to engage students in debates about different controversial political topics, including advocating against gun control.

Kirk is reportedly in critical condition, according to America First Post, a conservative news outlet.

Despite a previous report that police had arrested a suspect, “the suspect is not in custody,” UVU spokesperson Scott Trotter said in a statement. “Police are still investigating. Campus is closed for the rest of the day.”

A livestream of the event captured the incident from a distance, showing a large crowd of people outside on campus, running and screaming.

President Donald Trump quickly issued a statement praying for Kirk’s swift recovery. “A great guy top to bottom. GOD BLESS HIM,” the president wrote on Truth Social. Turning Point USA previously mobilized behind Trump during his 2024 presidential campaign.

JD Vance also issued a statement about the reported shooting. “Say a prayer for Charlie Kirk, a genuinely good guy and a young father,” he wrote on X.

And, weirdly enough, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted that he was “praying for” Kirk.

FBI Director Kash Patel published a statement that he was “closely monitoring reports” of the incident. “Our thoughts are with Charlie, his loved ones, and everyone affected. Agents will be on the scene quickly and the FBI stands in full support of the ongoing response and investigation,” Patel wrote on X.

Democratic activist David Hogg, a survivor of the Parkland school shooting and target of Kirk’s ire, also commented on the “horrifying news” that Kirk had been the victim of gun violence.

“Gun violence and political violence have to fucking stop,” Hogg wrote on X. “Charlie, his family, and all the students who had to witness the shooting are in my thoughts. We have disagreements, but we all agree something has to change.”

Earlier this year, Kirk mocked Hogg, saying that he was indistinguishable from a “survivor from a concentration camp.”

In 2023, Kirk said it was “worth” the cost of “some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.”

This story has been updated.

On Wednesday, border czar Tom Homan, as he is wont to do, threatened a local elected Democrat on Fox News.

This time, Homan targeted Boston’s Democratic mayor, Michelle Wu, who has earned national prominence—and the ire of Homan and the White House—for spiritedly defending her city from incursions by the Trump administration.

Asked about Wu’s staggering primary victory as she seeks reelection in November, Homan said, “I don’t care who the mayor is.… They’re not going to stop us. They can stay on the side and watch us do their job. However, they better not step over the line. They better not impede our efforts. Or there’s going to be consequences.

“We’re coming,” Homan continued. “We’re going to be there tomorrow. We’re going to be there the next day. We’re going to be there next month. We’re going to be there next year. You’re not stopping [us] from what we’re doing.”

Last week, Trump’s Justice Department sued Boston and Wu over the Boston Trust Act, which limits local authorities’ cooperation with federal immigration enforcement agencies. The DOJ argues that the law illegally obstructs the federal government—though Boston University law professor Sarah Sherman-Stokes told the Associated Press it is well within the city’s “constitutional right to limit their involvement in enforcing immigration law.”

Wu, for her part, condemned the lawsuit as an “unconstitutional attack” by a presidential administration “intent on attacking our community to advance their own authoritarian agenda.”

“This is our city,” the mayor said, “and we will vigorously defend our laws and the constitutional rights of cities, which have been repeatedly upheld in courts across the country. We will not yield.”