From tortured leftist to right-wing hopeful: The reinvention of Kim Moon-soo

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From tortured leftist to right-wing hopeful: The reinvention of Kim Moon-soo

Published: 16 May. 2025, 07:00 Updated: 02 Jun. 2025, 10:36

CHO JUNG-WOO
[email protected]

Audio report: written by reporters, read by AI

People Power Party presidential candidate Kim Moon-soo officially announces his bid for the June 3 presidential election at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, on April 9. [YONHAP]

People Power Party (PPP) presidential candidate Kim Moon-soo, a former labor minister under the Yoon Suk Yeol government, has unexpectedly emerged as a presidential candidate in the wake of political upheaval following Yoon’s botched martial law declaration.

Kim's sudden rise in popularity came as a surprise, especially considering he had largely vanished from the political spotlight after serving two terms as governor of Gyeonggi from 2006 to 2014.

Known today as a staunch conservative and vocal opponent of Yoon’s impeachment, Kim, 73, ironically comes from a background as a labor activist.

“I gave up the path of a revolutionary after witnessing the collapse of communist countries.” Kim said, during his official presidential bid announcement on April 9 at the National Assembly.

Kim's pursuit of the top office traces back to a story of being tortured and imprisoned for protesting against the former authoritarian regime to becoming a three-term lawmaker, two-term governor and now a conservative presidential hopeful.

Humble beginnings

Kim was born on Aug. 27, 1951, in a remote mountain village in Yeongcheon, North Gyeongsang, during the Korean War. He was the sixth of seven children.

At the time of his birth, the family lived relatively comfortably in a spacious hanok, a traditional Korean house. His father, Kim Seung-heon, was relatively well-educated for the era, having completed middle school under Japanese colonial rule. He began his career as a government official overseeing royal Silla tombs and later served as deputy head of his village and a civic school teacher.

Kim Moon-soo, right, poses for a photo with his brother on his first day at Seoul National University in an undated photo. [JOONGANG ILBO]

Their fortunes changed drastically when Kim’s father cosigned a relative’s debt, causing the family to lose everything. Kim was in fourth grade when they were forced to move to a shantytown, surviving on the income his mother earned through sewing. The family of nine crammed into a single room and subsisted on vegetable porridge. The seven siblings studied together under the dim light of a lantern, as their home had no electricity.

Despite the hardships, Kim excelled in school and became his family’s hope for a better future.

But his rebellious spirit emerged early. In September 1969, as a senior at Gyeongbuk High School, Kim joined protests against a constitutional amendment that allowed a third presidential term for late President Park Chung Hee. He was suspended indefinitely, the first of many suspensions during his school years. Luckily, the school allowed his return two weeks later.

The next year, he was accepted to Seoul National University (SNU), where he majored in business.

Protests, torture and imprisonment

Upon entering university, Kim was drawn into the student labor movement, influenced by his senior Kim Geun-tae, who later became the head of the liberal Uri Party.

When Kim Moon-soo was a second year in university, Kim Geun-tae, ahead of summer vacation, asked members of his student activist group whether they had considered working in a factory to experience life as laborers.

Students study in a lecture hall at Seoul National University, previously located in Jongno District, central Seoul, in an undated photo. [JOONGANG ILBO]

This was a year after the tragic self-immolation of Jeon Tae-il, a young laborer who protested inhumane working conditions.

Kim Moon-soo, then in his early 20s, agreed. He took a job at a sewing factory, hiding he was a university student, working 10 hours a day, six days a week. The pay was meager, but the experience inspired a deep respect for laborers and a commitment “to live alongside them.”

While working, he contracted typhoid fever from contaminated water and had to return home. During this time, he was expelled from SNU, along with 173 other students nationwide, for participating in protests, following a garrison decree on Oct. 15, 1971. He was able to return to school in 1973.

A collection of evidence presented by police to request the arrest and indictment of alleged student activists in April 1974 [JOONGANG ILBO]

Soon after the expulsion, a black jeep arrived at Kim’s house. He was taken to the Defense Security Command in Daegu, had his eyes covered, and transferred to Seobinggo-dong in Seoul, infamously nicknamed the Bingo Hotel. After he was interrogated there, he was transferred to the Korean Central Intelligence Agency at Mount Namsan.

“You made this illegal flyer, didn’t you?” the interrogator asked. “No, I had nothing to do with it,” Kim replied. “Don’t lie,” retorted the interrogated, swearing at Kim.

The building that used to house the Korean Central Intelligence Agency on Mount Namsan. central Seoul, is now a Youth Hostel. [JOONGANG ILBO]

Kim was beaten repeatedly but released after a few days when it was revealed he wasn’t involved. The incident intensified his resentment toward state authority and solidified his commitment to the labor movement.

In April 1974, Kim was expelled from SNU for the second time due to his involvement in nationwide student protests against the Park Chung Hee government.

He then began working at various factories: sewing, ironing and even as a boiler technician. In September 1981, he married Seol Nan-young, head of the Sejin Electronics labor union.

Protesters, largely composed of students and laborers, face off with police during a demonstration in Incheon on May 3, 1986. [JOONGANG ILBO]

On May 6, 1986, Kim was arrested for leading the May 3 Incheon Democratic Uprising — a student and labor-led protest calling for an end to military dictatorship, direct presidential elections and basic rights — and was later sentenced to three years in prison under the National Security Law. A year before that, he had co-founded a labor union with fellow activists Shim Sang-jeong and Rhyu Si-min.

He was initially held at the Seoul Detention Center, alongside roughly 500 political prisoners. Handcuffed in a 2.5-square-meter (27-square-feet) cell shared by five inmates, he was forced to eat with his hands still bound.

While Kim was behind bars, the country underwent seismic political change: the June 10 Democratic Uprising and the subsequent constitutional amendment allowing direct presidential elections.

He was released on Oct. 3, 1988, as part of a special pardon for National Foundation Day. The following year, the Soviet Union collapsed, along with his revolutionary dreams.

A turn to politics, and conservatism

Disillusioned with revolution, Kim turned to politics as a new avenue for progressive change.

In November 1990, he co-founded the Popular Party (Minjungdang) with Jang Gi-pyo, Lee Jae-oh and Lee Woo-jae, serving as the party’s labor committee chief. But the party performed poorly. In the 1992 general election, it fielded candidates in 51 districts and failed to win a single seat. It also fell short of the 2 percent vote threshold to maintain their party.

Following the party’s dissolution came a surprising call from late President Kim Young-sam, who asked Kim to join his conservative party, the then-ruling Democratic Liberal Party. On March 8, 1994, Kim joined the ruling party and was appointed head of its Bucheon Sosa District chapter.

Soon after, former colleagues regarded him a “traitor.”

“A failed labor activist who ended up at the wrong destination,” then-DP spokesperson Kim Yong-seok said.

Kim Moon-soo, second from right, shakes hands with late President Kim Young-sam after being appointed head of Democratic Liberal Party’s Bucheon Sosa District chapter in Gyeonggi in an undated photo. [JOONGANG ILBO]

As he stepped into politics, Kim also returned to finish his studies — 24 years and six months after first entering SNU. President Kim Young-sam had allowed students expelled for pro-democracy activities to return, letting Kim reenroll in the fall of 1993 at age 42.

In 1996, he ran for parliament to represent Bucheon’s Sosa District in Gyeonggi, traditionally a DP stronghold. Against the odds, thanks to his tireless campaigning and the help of his wife and fellow activists, Kim won, defeating Park Jie-won, one of late President Kim Dae-jung’s closest aides, by just 1,660 votes. This marked the beginning of Kim’s legislative career.

He then went on to serve two more National Assembly terms and was elected governor of Gyeonggi for two terms from 2006 to 2014.

“Changing one’s beliefs is like passing through purgatory. It’s a pain that doesn’t kill you, but doesn’t stop either,” Kim said in a 2010 interview with local newspaper Hankyoreh.

“They say geniuses have sudden realizations, but I’m no genius. My ideological shift didn’t happen overnight. Watching the collapse of the Soviet Union and East Germany, I came to believe that communism, which tries to combine contradictory ideas like ‘prosperous and equal’ or ‘free and altruistic,’ was a fiction.”

Kim Moon-soo, in his first term as a lawmaker, speaks during an interpellation session at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, in an undated photo. [JOONGANG ILBO]

After completing his terms as governor, Kim failed to secure his spot at the National Assembly in Daegu’s Suseong District in 2016 and also lost his bid for Seoul mayor in 2018.

He faded from public view until returning in 2022 as head of the Economic, Social and Labor Council under the Yoon government, followed by his nomination as labor minister in July 2024.

BY PARK JIN-SEOK,JEON MIN-GOO AND CHO JUNG-WOO [[email protected]]