U.S. federal agents search Southern California locations to probe Chinese maternity tourism

Federal investigators of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) searched over two dozens of locations Tuesday to investigate maternity tourists, mainly from China.

Virginia Kice, spokesperson for ICE, said in a statement that search warrants were served in the actions which began soon after the sunrise in Irvine, Rowland Heights and Walnut cities, all in Southern California.

The targets were the so-called "maternity tourists," who applied tourist visas and entered the United States with purpose to give birth to babies.

The whole chain of Chinese maternity tourism industry has been existing underground in Southern California for several years, from recruiting pregnant women coming to the United States to help them go to hospital until they recover and return to China with their babies.

Irvine, Rowland Heights and Walnut all have big Chinese communities. Chinese food stores and Chinese language services are convenient in these cities.

"Such businesses provide travel and lodging services to pregnant foreign nationals interested in coming to the United States to give birth so their offspring will be American citizens, " said Kice, adding that Tuesday morning's operation was designed to gather "further evidence related to a variety of possible criminal violations, including visa and tax fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy."

Chinese pregnant women usually pay several to dozens of thousand dollars for the services of those "maternity tourism" companies to help them get U.S. visa, get a place to live, go to hospital and other needs in the United States.

The federal agencies involved in Tuesday's actions included ICE Homeland Security Investigations, the Internal Revenue Service, U. S. Customs and Border Protection, the Department of State's Diplomatic Security Service, the Los Angeles Airport Police Department, the Irvine Police Department and the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.