President Lee Jae-myung on the 11th, regarding the Democratic Party of Korea introducing "ranked-choice voting" for its in-party primary to select a candidate for National Assembly speaker, said, "If Korea introduces a runoff system in elections such as the presidential election, it will likely discuss introducing ranked-choice voting at the same time."
That afternoon, Lee attached a post from a user on X (formerly Twitter) that asked, "Why rank choices when voting for the National Assembly speaker?" and said, "Ranked-choice voting was introduced together with the runoff system when I was the Democratic Party leader." The user, presumed to be a rights-bearing party member of the Democratic Party, said they chose candidate Cho Jeong-sik in this speaker primary and added, "There is only one person to pick, so I don't understand why we are ranking choices."
Ranked-choice voting is a system in which voters enter a "preference order" for all candidates. If there is no majority winner in the first-choice tally, the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes is eliminated, and the ballots that chose that candidate as first choice are transferred to the candidates marked as second choice. This is repeated until one candidate attains a majority. The aim is to achieve the effect of a runoff with a single round of voting.
Lee said, "When the first-round leader falls short of a majority, there is no need to hold an additional runoff; it is a plan to provisionally conduct a runoff in the first round," adding, "If, in a three-way primary, voters are made to vote in advance for first and second preferences, then if a runoff is required due to a failure to reach a majority, adding the second-choice votes of those who voted for the third-place finisher in the first round to the first- and second-place candidates has the same effect as having conducted a runoff."
However, Lee explained, "Ranked-choice voting is meant to save the expense and time required for a runoff, but it has the limitation of assuming that voters who chose first and second place in the first round will make the same choices in the runoff." Lee added, "Be aware that if you do not select a second choice, you will in effect abstain from the runoff if your first-choice candidate is eliminated, and please do not misunderstand—select both your first and second preferences."
Starting that day, the Democratic Party began selecting its next National Assembly speaker candidate with a two-day online vote by rights-bearing party members (20% weight). In this process it introduced a "ranked-choice" method selecting first through third place. Then on the 13th, it will determine the final candidate through an in-person vote by lawmakers (80% weight). Running in the primary are candidates Park Ji-won (five terms), Cho Jeong-sik (six terms), and Kim Tae-nyeon (five terms) in ballot order.