Lee Jae-myung, the president, on the 13th called the criticism over Presidential Office Policy Chief Kim Yong-beom's proposal to introduce a "national dividends" program "fake news for opinion manipulation." A day after the presidential office drew a line by saying it was "the policy chief's personal opinion," Lee directly posted on social media to rebut it.
Lee shared on X (formerly Twitter) a report titled "Venezuela comes to mind… controversy over Kim Yong-beom's 'AI windfall dividends'" and said, "What Chief Kim said was that we are reviewing a plan to pay national dividends from the government's excess tax revenues generated by excess profits in the artificial intelligence (AI) institutional sector," adding, "Some media edited this remark and spread a smear fake news that 'Deputy Minister Kim argued for reviewing a plan to pay national dividends from corporations' excess profits.'"
He went on, "Even though Deputy Minister Kim denied this and kindly explained it, and even related reports came out, why are they still doing such smear reporting?" and wrote, "Political condemnation or criticism, if not based on facts, undermines democracy."
Chief Kim wrote on Facebook the previous day, "The fruits of the AI infrastructure era are not the result drawn out only by specific corporations," proposing the introduction of a "national dividends program" to return them to the public. He said, "Excess profits in the AI era are concentrated by nature," and added, "Even if the nation becomes wealthier, the distribution of that wealth does not spread automatically. Korea has been strong in growth, but weak in socially spreading the fruits of growth."
As the People Power Party and other opposition groups criticized this, the presidential office said, "The content posted by Chief Kim is a personal opinion unrelated to any internal discussion or review at the presidential office."