Explainer: DP chief Lee Jae-myung polarizes public as potential early election looms
-
- MICHAEL LEE
- [email protected]
![Democratic Party leader Rep. Lee Jae-myung leaves the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, after the legislature passed an impeachment motion against President Yoon Suk Yeol on Dec. 14, 2024. [YONHAP]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/01/23/fd26a0ad-c9ca-42a4-94fb-8bb6a894c105.jpg)
Democratic Party leader Rep. Lee Jae-myung leaves the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, after the legislature passed an impeachment motion against President Yoon Suk Yeol on Dec. 14, 2024. [YONHAP]
Few Korean politicians are as loved — or reviled — as Rep. Lee Jae-myung, chief of the liberal Democratic Party (DP) and the current polling favorite to succeed impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol.
When Yoon declared martial law on Dec. 3, Lee called on fellow lawmakers to rush to the National Assembly to hold a vote that overturned the decree. His party then spearheaded an impeachment motion against the president that passed on Dec. 14.
While Yoon’s fate is unlikely to be decided by the Constitutional Court until late February or March at the earliest, his potential removal from office, and the prospect of an early presidential election 60 days afterward, has Koreans looking toward possible successors, among whom Lee leads by a long shot.
Lee’s front-runner status marks a remarkable reversal of fortunes for both him and Yoon, the two main “unlikable” candidates in the 2022 presidential election.
Yoon, who won that race by touting his success prosecuting corrupt politicians, now finds himself behind bars on charges of masterminding a military-led insurrection to overthrow the country’s democratic order, while Lee faces no strong conservative contenders for the presidency.
Yet according to the polls, the exit of an unlikable incumbent doesn’t make his erstwhile rival any more palatable.
In all public opinion surveys since Yoon’s impeachment, less than 40 percent of respondents have said they would back Lee in the next presidential election. According to a Gallup Korea poll released on Friday, just 31 percent said they wanted Lee to become president.
Distaste for Lee runs deep in conservative circles and especially among die-hard Yoon supporters, who have held placards calling for the DP leader’s arrest at rallies against the president’s impeachment.
![Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung watches news coverage of President Yoon Suk Yeol's arrest by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials while attending an emergency general meeting of lawmakers held at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, on Jan. 15. [NEWS1]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/01/23/5c73dbe5-0ddf-4d49-aed9-79d42534df31.jpg)
Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung watches news coverage of President Yoon Suk Yeol's arrest by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials while attending an emergency general meeting of lawmakers held at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, on Jan. 15. [NEWS1]
Who is Lee Jae-myung?
Throughout his political career, Lee has characterized himself as a hardscrabble advocate for the country’s economically vulnerable groups. He has frequently referred to his humble origins to emphasize his dedication to reducing social inequality.
Born the fifth out of seven children in an impoverished family in Andong, North Gyeongsang, in 1963, Lee began working in various factories in Seongnam, Gyeonggi, shortly after his family moved there when he was 12 years old.
While working with a machine that made baseball gloves, Lee suffered an injury to his left arm that was left untreated. His arm became permanently bent, exempting him from mandatory military service.
Despite working full-time, Lee passed middle school and high school through qualification exams and eventually gained admission to the law school at Chung-Ang University in 1982. He then passed the notoriously difficult state bar exam in 1986.
Though he could have qualified as a judge or a prosecutor with his scores from the judicial training institute, Lee decided to become a human rights lawyer like liberal figurehead Roh Moo-hyun, who later became president in 2002.
He opened his own firm in Seongnam in 1989, but decided to enter politics in 2006, after the city council rejected a proposal for a public medical institution that he and other residents had backed.
Lee first ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Seongnam in 2006. Two years later, he also lost a race for a seat in the National Assembly. However, he won his second mayoral bid in 2010, and he ended up serving two four-year terms in the position.
![Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, center, arrives at the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho District, southern Seoul, on Jan. 17. [YONHAP]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/01/23/a84566f9-ade4-4cc2-9248-23c9f12b7236.jpg)
Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, center, arrives at the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho District, southern Seoul, on Jan. 17. [YONHAP]
Why is Lee such a divisive figure?
Though Lee in recent years has been defined in opposition to Yoon, controversy has dogged his political career since the beginning.
As mayor of Seongnam, Lee enacted fiscal reforms to reduce the city’s debt, but also introduced the country’s first universal basic income program for the city’s young people and other welfare policies, which led critics to label him as a proponent of irresponsible government spending.
His advocacy of bold policies and penchant for speaking without a filter also won him large numbers of supporters and detractors.
Lee was one of the most vocal politicians in 2016 to unabashedly call on the DP to impeach then-President Park Geun-hye over influence peddling by her confidant Choi Soon-sil.
Though he lost his party’s 2017 primary to President Moon Jae-in, he later won the Gyeonggi governorship, which he used as a platform to push policies that invited more depictions of him as a populist, such as distributing 100,000 won ($84) to all residents of the province during the Covid-19 pandemic.
He resigned as governor to accept his party’s presidential nomination in 2021, though he lost the following year’s race against Yoon by a razor-thin margin.
But instead of withdrawing from politics after his defeat, Lee entered the National Assembly three months later through a by-election for Incheon’s Gyeyang B constituency.
In August the same year, he won the DP chairmanship, cementing his control over a party long dominated by veterans of the country’s pro-democracy movement during the 1970s and 80s.
His position within the DP grew only stronger after the party stacked its candidate slate with Lee loyalists ahead of the April 2024 general election, which it won by a landslide.
Yet the seeds of multiple scandals that would later stalk Lee were also planted during his political ascendancy.
A recording of a 2012 phone call between Lee and his third eldest brother’s wife, whom he repeatedly called by an unprintable expletive, was leaked in 2014 in the run-up to his second mayoral term.
He was later accused and tried on charges of trying to forcibly commit the same brother to a psychiatric hospital, though he was eventually acquitted in 2020.
However, the most serious accusations against Lee stem from his record as a mayor and governor.
What allegations does Lee currently face?
At present, Lee faces five criminal indictments tied to projects launched by the Seongnam and Gyeoggi governments under his leadership.
Three of those cases have gone to trial in recent months.
In early November, the Seoul Central District Court handed him a one-year suspended prison sentence for making false statements during his 2022 presidential run about a corruption scandal surrounding development projects in Seongnam.
Though Lee was recently acquitted by the court in another case where he was accused of suborning a former Seongnam city official to commit perjury, prosecutors have also filed an appeal.
His third trial, which is on charges of committing a breach of trust against the publicly-owned Seongnam Development Corporation, opened earlier this month.
He is accused in the case of skewing the profit distribution structure of a city-led development project in favor of minor private investors.
In June last year, he was further indicted on charges of directing illegal payments totaling $8 million to North Korea through intermediaries from 2019 to 2020.
Prosecutors allege that Lee’s vice governor and the chairman of an underwear manufacturer transferred the money to North Korean agents in China to facilitate his potential visit to Pyongyang. Both have been convicted.
In November, Lee was also charged with misusing an official expenses card issued by the Gyeonggi provincial government.
![Democratic Party (DP) leader Lee Jae-myung speaks during an anti-government rally organized by his party in Gwanghwamun Square in Jongno District, central Seoul, on Nov. 16, 2024. [YONHAP]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/01/23/963feb21-8a9d-4fd1-ae7a-69399ebb1f9b.jpg)
Democratic Party (DP) leader Lee Jae-myung speaks during an anti-government rally organized by his party in Gwanghwamun Square in Jongno District, central Seoul, on Nov. 16, 2024. [YONHAP]
How have the accusations against Lee affected domestic politics?
Though many of the allegations in the indictments had already been raised during Lee’s 2022 presidential run — and arguably helped tip the election in Yoon’s favor — their political significance has grown since Yoon’s impeachment.
Under the Public Official Election Act, Lee would be stripped of his parliamentary seat and his right to run in any elections for five years if he receives a final prison term or a fine of 1 million won or more.
However, the case where Lee is accused of lying on the campaign trial is the only one whose outcome could be decided if an early presidential election takes place in May.
Lee’s appeal in the case is due to be decided by Feb. 15. If he loses then, he can make one last appeal to the Supreme Court, which under customary guidelines is obliged to issue a ruling within three months.
Yoon’s conservative People Power Party (PPP) has used the concurrent indictments against Lee to argue he is a criminal suspect unfit to become president.
Some have gone so far as to argue that he sought a seat in the National Assembly to secure parliamentary immunity from arrest.
The PPP has also accused the DP of using its legislative majority to shield Lee from prosecutors and repeatedly expressed frustration with the pace of Lee’s ongoing trials.
The DP, in return, has accused the state prosecution service of pursuing politically motivated investigations against Lee at Yoon’s behest.
Lee himself has claimed that the prosecution, formerly led by Yoon, is singularly focused on “burying him” with indictments to distract voters from other issues, such as the country’s sluggish economy.
At an anti-government rally held in central Seoul after the first trial ruling in November, the DP leader vowed to remain unbowed by prosecutors' efforts to lock him up.
“Lee Jae-myung will not die. Democracy will not die. This country’s future will not die,” he said, tying his own political fate to that of the nation.
Updated, Jan. 22: Details of political offices held by Lee added.
BY MICHAEL LEE [[email protected]]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
To write comments, please log in to one of the accounts.
Standards Board Policy (0/250자)