In the Democratic Party of Korea convention, political circles on the 18th noted that as much attention as Kim Min-seok's election as party leader went to the defeat of Kim Yong, former deputy head of the Democracy Research Institute, who ran for supreme council member. Kim, the former deputy head, has been regarded as a key pro-Lee figure to the extent that President Lee Jae-myung once said he was "like my alter ego." But in this convention, he fell to the bottom after being outpaced by pro-Lee Chung figures, lawmakers Lee Sung-yoon and Han Min-soo, and failed to become a supreme council member.
Before Kim Yong's defeat, lawmakers Park Sung-joon and Lee Geon-tae, who were considered the two top pro-Lee figures, were also cut off in the preliminary race for supreme council members. At the time, with pro-Lee Chung candidates surviving while both Park Sung-joon and Lee Geon-tae were cut off, there was talk that "the firepower of the pro-Lee camp is weaker than expected."
With even Kim Yong, the former deputy head, losing in the final this time, some analyses said the pro-Lee camp's weakness was exposed. Jo Gwui-dong, head of strategy at Min Consulting, posted on Facebook that "Kim Yong's fall, along with Lee Geon-tae and Park Sung-joon failing to pass the preliminaries, clearly shows that the pro-Lee camp lacks a mass political base."
In fact, among the six candidates who made the final for supreme council member at the Democratic Party of Korea convention, Kim, the former deputy head, ranked last, sixth, in both the voting by dues-paying members and the general public opinion poll. He placed first in the delegates' vote, which reflects organizational strength. Also, Kim Min-seok, who ran for party leader from the pro-Lee camp, trailed former leader Jung Chung-rae in the public opinion poll.
A Democratic Party official said, "The pro-Lee camp led by Kim Min-seok lacked firepower more than expected, and the message from the pro-Lee Chung camp, fronted by former leader Jung Chung-rae, appears to have had a broader-than-expected popular impact."
The pro-Lee camp has emerged as the ruling bloc's mainstream since the launch of the Lee Jae-myung administration. But issues such as the special counsel for dismissal of indictments and supplementary investigation authority, and real estate measures dragged down President Lee's approval rating. In this situation, pro-Lee candidates were successively cut off or defeated in the party convention. There are assessments that the Kim Min-seok leadership has also had an unstable start.
Kim Ou-joon, a broadcaster with a pro-ruling-party bent, said on the 18th regarding Kim, the former deputy head, losing the race, "The message received by Democratic Party lawmakers will also be anything but ordinary," adding, "Lawmakers will start asking whether touting themselves as pro-Lee helps their own politics and their own election."