Rep. Song Young-gil of the Democratic Party of Korea, who is being mentioned as a candidate for the party convention, said Tuesday that "the president's view on the results of the Pyeongtaek-B National Assembly by-election differed from that of the party leadership."
Song made the remarks after attending a forum titled "Year Two of the Lee Jae-myung Government: Bolder Reform," hosted by Rep. Chun Jung-won at the National Assembly, where he met with reporters. "Didn't the president express a certain perception through yesterday's press conference?" he said.
"The president's view on the Pyeongtaek election differed from the leadership's sense of it," he said. "The president naturally expected the Democratic Party to win in Pyeongtaek, so it was apparent that he was very disappointed."
Song said, "On the contrary, those who helped candidate Kim were intensively attacked by our party's supporters. In the case of Rep. Boo Seung-chan, after giving a support speech for candidate Kim, he is said to have received enormous abuse in the comments." In the Pyeongtaek-B by-election, there have been observations that progressive votes were split as the negative smear campaign between Democratic Party candidate Kim Yong-nam and Rebuilding Korea Party candidate Cho Kuk intensified.
On whether he will run in the party convention, he said, "Last time, I said I would judge after watching the status of Chairman Jung Chung-rae," adding, "I'll only be able to tell how things will go after seeing that."
Earlier at the forum that day, Song stressed, "The next Democratic Party leadership should not expend energy on unnecessary conflict with the president, but should cooperate through close trust to drive reform." Regarding the results of this local election, he said, "Recently the Democratic Party says it won after this election was over, but a phenomenon is occurring where it is almost neck-and-neck with the People Power Party's approval ratings, so I am quite worried."
Song, who hopes to join the National Defense Committee as his next standing committee, plans to visit the United States on the 23rd to meet with political figures.
