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Top court to issue ruling on Lee Jae-myung's election law violation case on Thursday

Published: 29 Apr. 2025, 18:11

Democratic Party (DP) presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung, speaks during the DP Supreme Council meeting at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, on April 28. [NEWS1]

The Supreme Court will issue its ruling on liberal Democratic Party (DP) presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung’s election law violation case on Thursday, the court said Tuesday.

“The sentencing date for Lee's election law violation case has been set for 3 p.m. on May 1, 2025,” the Supreme Court said on Tuesday. The ruling will be delivered in the main courtroom of the Supreme Court, just nine days after referring the case to the full bench of justices on April 22.

Lee is accused of making false statements during his 2021 presidential campaign. He claimed in a broadcast appearance that he did not know the late Kim Moon-gi, former head of the development division at Seongnam Development Corporation.

He also stated during a parliamentary audit that the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport had threatened Seongnam City during the rezoning process of a Korea Food Research Institute site in Baekhyeon-dong.

In the first trial, the court found Lee guilty of making false statements in two instances: the so-called golf remark, in which he denied playing golf with Kim, and his remarks related to Baekhyeon-dong. He was sentenced to a year in prison, suspended for two years.

However, the appellate court found him not guilty on all charges. The court ruled that the statement regarding Kim concerned Lee's “awareness,” not his “actions,” and thus could not be punished as a false statement.

As for the Baekhyeon-dong comments, the court judged that Lee’s claim — that he acted in accordance with a legal obligation under the Special Act on the Relocation of Public Institutions — constituted an expression of opinion and could not be deemed false.

The Supreme Court is now set to rule on whether the divergent rulings in the lower courts were appropriate and whether each of Lee’s statements qualifies as a punishable falsehood under the Public Official Election Act.

Should the court issue a direct guilty verdict, the key detail would be whether the sentence includes a fine of at least 1 million won ($700). Any amount above that threshold would disqualify Lee from running, while a lesser amount would not impact his candidacy.

Translated from the JoongAng Ilbo using generative AI and edited by Korea JoongAng Daily staff.
BY HYEON YE-SEUL [[email protected]]