Ex-liberal, now centrist, Lee Jae-myung wins South Korean presidential election with ease

SEOUL, South Korea — Lee Jae-myung, a longtime liberal politician who recently rebranded himself as a centrist, easily won South Korea’s presidential election Tuesday.

Voters flocked to the polls amid domestic turbulence, questions about the country’s relationship with Trump-era America and growing concerns about an ever-expansive China.

Before the election, Mr. Lee shifted his party, the left-leaning Democratic Party of Korea, to more centrist positions. Once victory was clear, he told reporters outside his house, “I will do my best to fulfill the big responsibility and mission given to me.”

Exit polls by the three main broadcasters found that Mr. Lee won 51.7% of the vote and his conservative opponent, Kim Moon-soo of the People Power Party, trailed with 39.3%. That gap was overstated, but by the time 77% of votes had been officially counted, Mr. Lee was comfortably ahead, with 48% over Mr. Kim’s 43%.

“Our slogan during the election was that we should punish [the PPP] overwhelmingly,” the DPK’s spokesperson told broadcaster YTN around 8:45 p.m. “But today, we must not be arrogant.”

Early tallies of voter turnout reached 79.4%.

The campaign for the five-year presidency was short. President Yoon Suk Yeol of the PPP stunned the nation on Dec. 3 by declaring martial law. His impeachment amid a political crisis triggered the election two years ahead of schedule.

Mr. Lee and Mr. Kim led an all-male field. Mr. Kim’s failure to merge candidacies with other conservatives further undercut a campaign that lagged far behind Mr. Lee’s in opinion polls.

Mr. Lee’s mandate is meaty. Alongside his presidential win, the DPK controls the National Assembly for the next three years, leaving Korean conservatives virtually powerless.

He assumes immediate power Wednesday at the presidential office in the Ministry of National Defense compound.

Mr. Yoon moved the office there from the presidential Blue House. Persistent rumors have it that shamans urged the move because of the dire fates of so many presidents and ex-presidents: exile, assassination, suicide and prison.

Mr. Yoon is battling prosecutors who insist that martial law constituted insurrection. The charge carries potential sentences of life in jail or even death.

Korea’s new president

Mr. Lee, 61, is a formidable persona with a childhood background of deep poverty.

He is a no-nonsense figure and a beneficiary of Mr. Yoon’s blunder. Mr. Lee livestreamed his actions on the night of martial law.

Speeding to the National Assembly, he evaded commandos and police and rallied representatives to vote down martial law three hours after its declaration.

Mr. Lee earned his political chops as a mayor and provincial governor, but he lost the last presidential election against Mr. Yoon by a whisker. Before that, he had lost his party’s primary.

In February, Mr. Lee rebranded the customarily leftist DPK, to raised eyebrows, as “center right.”

On geopolitical touchstones, he has committed to maintaining the U.S. alliance as the cornerstone of national security.

Reversing pro-China reputation

Mr. Lee is a consistent Japan basher but has said, less effusively, that he will not degrade an emerging Seoul-Tokyo-Washington security trilateral.

However, he is unlikely to ignore the divisive Seoul-Tokyo historical disputes that Mr. Yoon shelved.

Alongside conservative suspicions about Mr. Lee’s new political stance, some question his endless but effectively defended legal entanglements on charges such as corruption and funneling money to North Korea.

He has made no secret of his desire to thaw frozen relations with Pyongyang. That may sync with sentiments of President Trump, who in his first term enjoyed a bromance with Kim Jong-un.

Otherwise, U.S. relations look fraught.

Mr. Lee has until July 9 to work out a trade deal before Washington imposes tariffs on Korean products. South Korea has run massive trade surpluses with the U.S. for decades.

On the strategic front, the U.S. prioritizes deterring China over North Korea. Mr. Lee may face pressure from Washington to reduce the number of Korea-based GIs, pay more for their costs and shift their mission from the peninsula to regionwide.

The issues, the voters

Voting day, a sun-drenched public holiday, showcased stability, even jollity. TV broadcasters illustrated exit poll tallies with cartoon avatars of Mr. Lee and Mr. Kim competing in outdoor exercises, football and even a toilet-plunging contest.

Behind these upbeat optics, Mr. Lee’s challenges are multifaceted.

His country is politically polarized.

Mr. Yoon, whose Cabinet appointees had sustained unprecedented impeachments at the hands of the DPK in the National Assembly, said “anti-state forces” were in play and pointed the finger at Chinese electoral interference.

Many conservatives who believe these allegations see Mr. Yoon as a heroic figure who sacrificed himself. They are deeply suspicious of the National Election Commission.

Observers from a private U.S. group, the National Election Integrity Association, reported a number of irregularities in early voting last week, including in vote counting, “that go far beyond plausible human error.” The team, which worked with local observers and conducted site visits, urged the National Election Commission to acknowledge the “gravity” of alleged issues.

The National Election Commission issued two apologies for some early voting issues.

However, Grant Newsham, a member of the four-member National Election Integrity Association team, was not satisfied.

“The NEC had to do something, but these apologies do not get to the fundamental shortcomings of their systems and their total lack of transparency,” he said. “When any claim is made about irregularities, they do not get examined; they stonewall.”

South Korea’s economic and social challenges are intertwined.

The economy has matured, leaving highly educated youths underemployed and unable to acquire homes. South Korea also faces a demographic crisis driven by a tumbling birth rate.

Some fear that 2024 was “Peak Korea,” after which the country’s fortunes, ascendant since the 1960s, will begin a long, slow decline.

What matters for America

South Korea, a U.S. treaty ally strategically sited on the doorsteps of China and North Korea, offers some 28,000 U.S. troops their only boot print in continental Asia. At the epicenter of Northeast Asia, South Korea is also central to multiple global supply chains, including computer chips, steel, ships and weaponry.

Complicating Washington relations, Seoul cannot ignore neighboring economic giant Beijing nor nuclear-armed Pyongyang, each a fraternal neighbor and a deadly enemy.

Many South Koreans vote along regional lines. That makes the national capital key.

Some 10 million middle-class citizens live in Seoul, which is surrounded by port, dormitory and factory towns that, with the capital, house half the nation’s 51-million-strong population.

Seoul residents who spoke to The Washington Times on Tuesday were divided.

“I was not happy with the candidates, but there was no other choice,” said Lee Tae-ha, a marketing professional. “Their campaigns were mainly criticizing each other. They didn’t communicate their policies: security, economic, commercial, educational, depolarization.”

He voted for Mr. Lee.

“He has more knowledge and experience, and he went through bad situations in the past,” he said. “Martial law was crazy. It cost a lot of people money, caused pain, an economic downturn. Who’s going to pay?”

Another Lee voter was Chang Su-beom, who runs a design firm.

“I was only happy with candidate Lee,” he said. “He is the most fair leader, the most democratic, the most effective.”

Sarah Song, who runs a public relations firm, differed.

“Lee is a criminal, so I can’t support him,” she said. “Someone with no integrity should not be a leader.”

Others voted for politics over personalities.

“I voted for the conservative party as the leftist party has always been too vague about their position toward North Korea and human rights,” said Jeon Areum, a housewife. “The conservatives have a better attitude about relations with other countries.”

Martial law impacted electoral choices.

“When you think about why this election happened, it was pretty obvious we had no choice but Lee,” Mr. Chang said.

“Martial law made me more supportive of Yoon; it was not a 1970s or ’80s type of martial law,” said Ms. Song, referring to South Korea’s pre-democratic era of authoritarian governance. “I dug into what was happening in political circles, and I saw why he did it. Everything added up.”