Who is Lee Jae-myung, South Korea’s presidential hopeful

Earlier than the occasions of three December 2024, Lee Jae–myung’s path to South Korea’s presidency was suffering from obstacles.

Ongoing authorized circumstances, investigations for corruption and allegations of abusing energy all appeared set to derail the previous opposition chief’s second presidential bid.

Then a constitutional disaster modified every part.

On that evening, former president Yoon Suk Yeol’s abortive try to invoke martial regulation set in movement a sequence of occasions that seems to have cleared the trail for Lee.

Now, because the Democratic Social gathering candidate, he’s the frontrunner to win South Korea’s election on 3 June.

It is a dramatic reversal of fortunes for the 61-year-old, who on the time of Yoon’s martial regulation declaration stood convicted of constructing false statements throughout his final presidential marketing campaign in 2022.

These costs nonetheless solid a protracted shadow over Lee, and will but threaten his years-long pursuit of the highest job. However they’re additionally simply the newest in a string of controversies which have dogged him all through his political profession.

A rags-to-riches origin story mixed with a bullish political fashion has made Lee right into a divisive determine in South Korea.

“Lee Jae-myung’s life has been stuffed with ups and downs, and he usually takes actions that stir controversy,” Dr Lee Jun-han, professor of political science and worldwide research at Incheon Nationwide College, tells the BBC.

These actions usually embrace makes an attempt at progressive reform – equivalent to a pledge, made throughout his 2022 presidential marketing campaign, to implement common primary revenue scheme – which problem the prevailing energy construction and established order in South Korea.

“Due to this, some folks strongly assist him, whereas others mistrust or dislike him,” Dr Lee says. “He’s a extremely controversial and unconventional determine – very a lot an outsider who has made a reputation for himself in a method that does not match conventional Democratic Social gathering norms.”

In a latest memoir, Lee described his childhood as “depressing”. Born in 1963 in a mountain village in Andong, Gyeongbuk Province, he was the fifth of 5 sons and two daughters, and – as a consequence of his household’s tough circumstances – skipped center college to illegally enter the workforce.

As a younger manufacturing facility employee, Lee suffered an industrial accident the place his fingers bought caught in a manufacturing facility energy belt, and on the age of 13 suffered a everlasting harm to his arm after his wrist was crushed by a press machine.

Lee later utilized for and was allowed to sit down entrance exams for highschool and college, passing in 1978 and 1980 respectively. He went on to check regulation with a full scholarship, and handed the Bar Examination in 1986.

In 1992, he married his spouse Kim Hye-kyung, with whom he has two kids.

He labored as a human rights lawyer for nearly 20 years earlier than getting into politics in 2005, becoming a member of the social-liberal Uri Social gathering, a predecessor of the Democratic Social gathering of Korea and the ruling get together on the time.

Whereas his poor upbringing has drawn scorn from members of South Korea’s higher class, Lee’s success in constructing his political profession from the bottom up has earned him assist from working-class voters and those that really feel disenfranchised by the political elite.

He was elected mayor of Seongnam in 2010, rolling out a sequence of free welfare insurance policies throughout his tenure, and in 2018 grew to become governor of the broader Gyeonggi Province.

Lee would go on to obtain popularity of his response to the Covid-19 pandemic, throughout which he clashed with the central authorities as a consequence of his insistence on offering common aid grants for all residents of the province.

It was additionally throughout this time that Lee grew to become the Democratic Social gathering’s remaining presidential candidate for the primary time in October 2021 – dropping by 0.76 proportion factors. Lower than a 12 months later, in August 2022, he was elected because the get together’s chief.

From that time on, Dr Lee says, Lee dialled again on the controversial, fire-and-brimstone strategy for which he had grow to be infamous – opting as an alternative to play it protected and preserve a low profile.

“After [Lee’s] time period as a governor, his reformist picture pale considerably as he targeted extra on his presidential ambitions,” he says. “Nonetheless, on sure points – like addressing previous wrongs [during the Japanese colonial era], welfare and corruption – he has constructed a loyal and passionate assist base by taking a agency and uncompromising stance.”

This uncompromising perspective has its detractors, with many members and supporters of the ruling Individuals Energy Social gathering (PPP) viewing Lee as aggressive and abrasive in his strategy.

Lee’s political profession has additionally been marred by a sequence of scandals – together with a drink driving incident in 2004, disputes with relations within the late 2010s and allegations of an extramarital affair that emerged in 2018.

Whereas in different elements of the world voters have proven forgiveness and even assist for controversial politicians, in South Korea – a rustic that’s nonetheless comparatively conservative in what it expects of public figures – such scandals haven’t usually performed effectively.

Lately, Lee’s political ambitions have been saddled with much more urgent controversies – together with the continued authorized circumstances that proceed to hold over him, threatening to hamstring if not scuttle his possibilities at election.

One in all these issues a string of high-profile costs, together with corruption, bribery and breach of belief, related to a land growth undertaking in 2023.

One other, maybe extra important authorized battle issues allegations that Lee made a knowingly false assertion throughout a debate within the final presidential marketing campaign.

Through the debate, which aired on South Korean tv in December 2021, Lee had denied personally understanding Kim Moon-ki, a key determine in a corruption-ridden land growth scandal who had taken his personal life simply days earlier.

Prosecutors allege that declare was false, thus violating the Public Official Election Act, and in November 2024 Lee was convicted of the false statements cost and given a one-year suspended jail sentence.

Then, in March, an appeals courtroom cleared him of the fees – just for that ruling to be overturned by South Korea’s Supreme Court docket. On the time of writing, the case continues to be awaiting a verdict.

Different threats towards Lee’s future political ambitions posed a extra deadly hazard.

In January 2024, whereas answering questions from reporters outdoors the development website of a deliberate airport in Busan, Lee was stabbed within the neck by a person who had approached him asking for an autograph.

The harm to Lee’s jugular vein, although requiring in depth surgical procedure, was not important – however he now campaigns behind bulletproof glass, carrying a bulletproof vest, surrounded by brokers carrying ballistic briefcases.

The assailant, who had written an eight-page manifesto and needed to make sure that Lee by no means grew to become president, was later sentenced to fifteen years in jail.

The assault raised issues about deepening political polarisation in South Korea – embodied maybe most publicly within the bitter rivalry between Lee and Yoon, and extra privately within the nation’s more and more excessive on-line discourse.

In December 2023, simply weeks earlier than Lee was attacked, a survey sponsored by the newspaper Hankyoreh discovered that greater than 50% of respondents mentioned they felt South Korea’s political divide worsening.

Some declare that, as Democratic Social gathering chief, Lee performed a significant position in fuelling the issue, often blocking motions by Yoon’s authorities and successfully rendering him a lame duck president.

Such fixed stonewalling by the Democratic Social gathering solely exacerbated Yoon’s management struggles – which additionally included repeated impeachment makes an attempt towards administration officers and fixed opposition to his finances.

Lastly, because the stress towards him mounted, the previous president took the drastic step of declaring martial regulation.

Yoon’s declaration of martial regulation on 3 December – made in a self-proclaimed bid to get rid of “anti-state forces” and North Korea sympathisers – served because the catalyst for Lee to emerge as a number one presidential candidate.

Inside hours of the declaration, Lee appealed to the general public through a livestream broadcast and urged them to assemble in protest outdoors the Nationwide Meeting constructing in central Seoul.

Hundreds responded, clashing with police and blocking navy items as opposition lawmakers rushed into the meeting constructing, clambering over fences and partitions in a determined try to dam Yoon’s order.

Lee was amongst them, climbing over the fence to enter the Nationwide Meeting and serving to to cross the decision to raise martial regulation.

The Democratic Social gathering later determined to question President Yoon – a call that was unanimously upheld by South Korea’s Constitutional Court docket on 4 April, 2025.

It was then that Lee started the trail to a full-fledged election bid, asserting his resignation as chief of the Democratic Social gathering on 9 April forward of his presidential run. Within the Democratic Social gathering presidential main held on April 27, he was chosen as the overall candidate with overwhelming assist.

The results of Yoon’s abortive martial regulation try was a political maelstrom from which South Korea continues to be reeling: a constitutional disaster that ended the previous president’s profession and left his PPP in tatters.

However of the small few who’ve managed to leverage that chaos to their benefit, none have benefitted greater than Lee.

Now the controversial presidential candidate awaits the decision on his political future – not solely from the South Korean folks, but additionally the courts.

If his responsible ruling is finally confirmed, Lee will probably lose his seat within the Nationwide Meeting. As a candidate, that might stop him from working for president for a interval of 5 years.

However with the courts having now authorized Lee’s request to postpone his authorized hearings till after the election, one other risk has emerged: that Lee, who stays the electoral favorite, may very well be convicted after profitable the presidency.

And that would imply that South Korea, having simply endured a months-long interval of political turmoil, is probably not achieved with its management dramas simply but.