[Joo Young-jin's News Briefing]
When quoting this interview, please cite the program title 'SBS <Joo Young-jin's News Briefing>'. Copyright belongs to SBS.
■ Broadcast: SBS <Joo Young-jin's News Briefing> Mon – Fri (14:00 – 15:20)
■ Host: Anchor Joo Young-jin
■ Guest: Lim Mi-ae, Democratic Party Supreme Council candidate
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● Interview with Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate Lim Mi-ae
"More party members showing interest after speech message... I believe a turnaround is possible"
"First reason for running is desperation... If status quo continues, no results in TK"
"Feel supported as I bring forward Democratic values"
"Honam support has little leeway left... To win, DP must win over TK"
"Party leadership should not divide party members and lawmakers"
"Voting before speeches format... Unfortunate that candidates' policies and visions are not properly shared"
"Supplementary investigative power is not main convention issue... Unfortunate to have a convention without key issues"
"Political landscape remains unstable even if all Democratic and progressive capabilities are mobilized"
"Must build a winning Democratic Party through continuous and stable reform"
"Need to convince rational moderates and TK... Lim Mi-ae is best suited for this role"
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[Anchor Joo Young-jin] The competition among candidates running for the Democratic Party's Supreme Council is also fierce. Regardless of her results so far, many members within the Democratic Party seem to be paying attention to candidate Lim Mi-ae. Candidate Lim Mi-ae is here with us. Welcome.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Hello.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] It feels a bit different from when you came as a panelist on 'Joo Young-jin's News Briefing' compared to today, as you are appearing as a candidate.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Thank you for having me.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] You must be very busy.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yes, I'm very busy. I set aside a day to stay in Seoul for media interviews.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Last week, voting results among party members were announced in two regions, Busan-Ulsan-Gyeongnam and Chungcheong. I wonder if it was a bit disappointing for you, candidate Lim Mi-ae, but do you feel you confirmed potential, or how do you see it?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] I'm in seventh place. And there's a gap between sixth and seventh place. Of course, it would be best for me to move up to sixth place, but honestly, I'm not a politician with high public recognition, nor have I been involved in national politics. On top of that, I made a late start, so party members had very few opportunities to get to know me. Only now, over two days of speeches, are people starting to take an interest and ask, "Who is Lim Mi-ae?" Many party members are reacting to the message I'm sending. I believe a turnaround is fully possible.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] The voting by party members with voting rights in Honam next week is very—of course, the Seoul metropolitan area has more members—but Honam is a very important region, isn't it?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yes, 33%.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] You must have high expectations for Honam.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yesterday, I met people in Gwangju, and they asked me, "What if voting for you, Lim Mi-ae, turns out to be a wasted vote?" Hearing that, I reflected on how people who do politics for the Democratic Party in Daegu and Gyeongbuk view wasted votes differently. Many people consistently go out to vote for the Democratic Party even when they know their vote might be wasted, and that support gradually builds up. So I told them not to fear a wasted vote, but rather to remember the dream Kim Dae-jung had of breaking out of regional party boundaries through his Eastward Expansion policy, the dream Roh Moo-hyun attempted, and what Kim Boo-kyum tried in the last local elections—all of which were frustrated. I asked that Jeonnam, Jeonbuk, and Gwangju now support our desire for internal change, and everyone responded with great emotion and promised their support, which gave me strength.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Watching your speech earlier, I thought about President Roh Moo-hyun's dream that was never realized in Yeongnam. I wondered if that needed to be expressed more specifically. Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam have reached a point where the Democratic Party can compete almost evenly with the People Power Party after President Roh's challenge. But Daegu and Gyeongbuk still remain...
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] That's right.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] For the Democratic Party...
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It's Daegu and Gyeongbuk, which can be called the last barren ground, but from my perspective, I need to keep the boundary broad...
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Keep it broad.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Only then can I appeal to party members. In our Daegu and Gyeongbuk, party members with voting rights account for only 1.8%.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] I heard they are giving bonus points this time. About how many percent?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] 5%.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] 5%.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It's 5%, but in fact, this doesn't strictly align with the basic principle of one person, one vote. On the other hand, if you give too much weight...
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] People might ask, "Then why bother with one person, one vote?"
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] And it shouldn't be a situation where it decides the outcome. So I don't think giving weighting like this is a fundamental solution, but anyway, it's 5%. Since a 5% weight is given to the votes obtained by all candidates, I see it as having little real meaning.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Your decision to challenge for the Supreme Council this time seems to go beyond simply running as a representative of Daegu and Gyeongbuk. What is the reason?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] First and foremost, desperation.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Desperation.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] We want to win, too. In the recent local elections, we put forward Kim Boo-kyum, the best candidate we could field, but we lost. From our perspective, there is a sense of crisis. Through this sense of crisis, I also felt that over the past year, the Democratic Party leadership showed many disappointing sides to the public as the leadership of a ruling party. So I felt that if the status quo continues, it will be far from enough for the Democratic Party to gain love from more voters, finally win, and achieve results in Daegu and Gyeongbuk, which is why I decided to run.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Former Daegu mayoral candidate Kim Boo-kyum publicly declared his support for candidate Lim Mi-ae.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Speaker Woo Won-sik and Representative Lee So-young also expressed support for me, and many other lawmakers support me. In fact, when I passed the preliminary primary, people were very surprised. "How did she do it?" Because there were people who had been preparing for the Supreme Council much longer than me.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Preparing for it.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] There were people preparing to run for Supreme Council who had national recognition. But when I called Central Committee members, their reaction was, "Yes, that's the spirit of the Democratic Party." They said there's no way for the Democratic Party to win without embracing Daegu and Gyeongbuk, and they encouraged me. So I personally believe that not only former Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum, but many people are cheering for me as I fight upholding Democratic values, even though I ran as a representative of Yeongnam.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] When South Korean citizens and our viewers look at politics, factors like "the president is from my hometown," "the prime minister is from my hometown," or "the opposition leader is from my hometown" play a role in their judgment. Although President Lee Jae-myung belongs to the Democratic Party, his hometown is Andong, Gyeongbuk, which is considered a barren land for the party. Has President Lee Jae-myung's election as president had any impact on public sentiment in Daegu and Gyeongbuk? Is there any change?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] There is change. In last year's presidential election, the support Gyeongbuk showed was 25%.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Is that the highest a Democratic candidate has ever received in any presidential election?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It was the highest. In Andong, candidate support reached nearly 30%, which was the highest, while Daegu was 23%. Meanwhile, support in Honam exceeded 85%. I believe Honam doesn't have much leeway left to increase its support for the Democratic Party further. Ultimately, for the Democratic Party to win, it must win over Daegu and Gyeongbuk, as well as rational moderates. That is how the Democratic Party wins, but the party currently lacks a strategy for this. Looking at what the leadership has shown so far, it seems like they are simply abandoning Daegu and Gyeongbuk. The sentiment among the voters who cast 586,000 votes for candidate Kim Boo-kyum—many voting for the Democratic Party for the first time in their lives—is shifting. If the Democratic Party takes no responsibility for this simply because it failed to produce a winner, I don't think that's the attitude of a responsible ruling party.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Listening carefully to what you've said during this primary process, I get the impression that you are strongly criticizing candidate Jung Chung-rae, who recently served as party leader, and the decisions and judgments made by the party leadership at that time. Is that correct?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yes. Experiencing the past year, there are several reasons. Most recently, dividing party members and National Assembly members, 160 versus 1.6 million. Ultimately...
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Saying "the owners of the party are its members."
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Saying, "Members own the party, protect me." Frankly, those are remarks a former party leader should not make. He should help lawmakers and party members act as one to fulfill their role as the ruling party and carry out reforms that meet the public's standards, but I saw this kind of division happening routinely. Furthermore, regarding supplementary investigative authority, while the president asked for deliberation, his leadership style is deeply accustomed to declarations and assertions rather than deliberation or debate. And when talking about "only party sentiment"—if we were in a period with under 100 parliamentary seats where we had to unite tightly as a core, "only party sentiment" would make sense. But we are the ruling party. Combined with the broader pro-government coalition, we have 180 seats. In this situation, we need to shift our perspective from "only party sentiment" to "only the public." In that regard, I pointed it out because I felt his leadership fell very short as a reliable partner for the remainder of the Lee Jae-myung administration's governance.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] If so, showing such a critical view of candidate Jung Chung-rae, does that mean you have a specific candidate in mind that you hope becomes the next party leader?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yes, I do.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Is it candidate Kim Min-seok?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] I do have someone in mind, but when I spoke about it publicly before, some party members were hurt. They said, "Since when does a Supreme Council candidate publicly announce which party leader candidate they support? Speak with your own voice and be evaluated on that." Because many told me that, while I do have a candidate I support, I try to avoid stating it on broadcast media.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] You can tell me after the interview is over.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] Yes.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] I see. The Democratic Party's national convention is developing very fiercely, but the speech sessions have turned out a bit strange. For example, when voting takes place in Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam, I heard voting takes place before the speeches?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] That's correct.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Then those members are voting in advance without seeing the speeches?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] That's right.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] That seems a bit strange.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It's very strange. So we submitted an opinion to the election commission stating that elections shouldn't be conducted this way, but this has been running like a long-standing practice. Before, speeches were held on the day delegate voting took place, so it was somewhat acceptable, but now that the delegate system has effectively been neutralized, holding speeches after voting is completely finished creates huge dissatisfaction among party members. Also, voter turnout is currently very low. I think this is one of the reasons. So it's disappointing that candidates' policies and visions are not properly shared with party members.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Some have suggested allowing additional voting, but candidate Jung Chung-rae's camp responded, "This is a voting coup. How can anyone so nonchalantly suggest changing the rules in the middle of a game?"
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] That would actually be difficult. Although I raised that point as well, changing the rules now is practically impossible. But since this is a really serious issue, I am pointing it out so that at least for the next national convention or any event where party members participate together, it shouldn't be operated in this manner.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Recently, a revision bill to the Criminal Procedure Act aimed at completely abolishing supplementary investigative authority passed the National Assembly and was approved by the Cabinet. Despite views presented by some—particularly Minister of Justice Jung Sung-ho and President Lee Jae-myung—that exceptions should be allowed, the Democratic Party proceeded with complete abolition. The president stated, "I will not exercise veto power; it does not reach that level." Is this issue currently a major point of contention at the Democratic Party convention, or is the dominant atmosphere now to watch and see since it has passed?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It's not becoming a main issue. Even during debates, as was the case during yesterday's TV debate, arguments focused on non-essential issues.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Among the party leader candidates.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] It turned into questions like "Why didn't you provide a government proposal when you were prime minister?" or "Why didn't you call the party leader?" To which the former prime minister responded, "I communicated with the policy committee chairman; the channel between party and government is the policy committee." It tends to devolve into a truth battle over the process, but from the public's perspective, that argument has little meaning. So I wish they wouldn't engage in that debate. Instead, as the abolition of supplementary investigative authority has already been finalized within the party, we need to closely examine the issue of protecting victims, which the president and minister were concerned about, and ensure that what the public fears does not happen.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] What is the biggest issue in the national convention process?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] The fact that there is none right now seems to be the biggest disappointment for me.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] That there are no clear issues.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] On one side, people are still talking about one person, one vote and reform. If you ask what the main issue is, it seems to be what kind of leadership and who should center the leadership to properly support the governance of the Lee Jae-myung administration. In that regard, everyone claims they will do it. But one person has already shown over the past year how they supported governance, and that evaluation is being judged in this convention. When you look at all this, the public might think, "What on earth are these people fighting over?"
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] In that sense, as you mentioned earlier that you entered this Supreme Council race with genuine desperation, I will give candidate Lim Mi-ae a chance to deliver a message directly to Democratic Party members, supporters, and viewers: "Please listen to this one thing urgently, for the Democratic Party to have hope and progress in the future."
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] One of the reasons I ran was the presidential election held last year following martial law and impeachment. Although candidate Lee Jae-myung appeared to win in the end, if you combine the votes of candidate Kim Moon-soo and candidate Lee Jun-seok, he actually lost. That means our society currently has an unstable political landscape where even if we gather all capabilities of the democratic and progressive camps, an election is barely won or lost. Therefore, it is crucial for the Democratic Party to win continuously and stably and pursue reform with stability, and to do that, we must build a winning Democratic Party. For that purpose, what's important is convincing rational moderates to join us and having a Democratic Party strategy for Yeongnam, especially Daegu and Gyeongbuk. The Democratic Party must prepare this strategy as it forms new leadership through this national convention, and Lim Mi-ae is the person best suited for that role.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Do you have any plans to campaign together with former candidate Kim Boo-kyum?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] I won't ask him that.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] You haven't asked?
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] I already felt sorry about the last election.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Understood. That was an interview with lawmaker Lim Mi-ae, candidate for the Democratic Party's Supreme Council. We will look forward to good news.
[Lim Mi-ae / Democratic Party Supreme Council Candidate] I will do my best. Thank you.
[Anchor Joo Young-jin] Thank you for speaking with us.
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