Environmental activists who graded climate-related pledges by candidates running in the general election and assigned ratings by candidate have received finalized fines.
The Supreme Court's No. 3 division (presiding Justice Noh Kyung-pil) said on the 14th that it upheld the lower court ruling that fined a person surnamed Park (74) 1 million won and a person surnamed Byun (70) 700,000 won in an appeal of their case on charges of violating the Public Official Election Act.
Park and Byun, who ran a civic group in Changwon, South Gyeongsang, founded an environmental advocacy group, saying they would respond in solidarity to the climate crisis. Park was the representative at the time of its founding, and Byun served as co-representative starting in Apr. 2024.
Ahead of the 22nd National Assembly election in Apr. 2024, the group scored the pledges submitted to the election commission by 11 candidates running in Changwon by dividing them into pledges with a good impact on the climate and pledges with a bad impact. After tallying the scores, it selected three excellent candidates, three insufficient candidates, and two failing candidates, and announced the results at a press conference.
The Public Official Election Act prohibits the media or civic groups from assigning scores by candidate or ranking or rating candidates to create a hierarchy. Prosecutors indicted Park and Byun, finding that they violated the election law. During the trial, they argued, "Before holding the press conference, we inquired with the election commission and were told that assigning ratings by candidate does not constitute a violation of the election law."
The first trial found their conduct violated the election law and fined Park 1 million won and Byun 700,000 won. The first trial court did not accept their claim, noting that when Park inquired with the South Gyeongsang election commission, it was guided to the effect that "when comparing and evaluating candidates' policy pledges, you must not assign rankings."
The second trial dismissed the appeal. The appellate court said, "In the press conference statement, the candidates' names were listed from top to bottom in the order of 'excellent, average, insufficient, failing,'" and found, "Even if the defendants did not set a ranking, it is hard to see this as not constituting hierarchical ordering."
The Supreme Court dismissed Park and others' appeal, saying the lower court did not misunderstand the legal principles regarding "hierarchical ordering" under the Public Official Election Act.