[Anchor]

The regional primary tour to elect the leader of the Democratic Party has kicked off in the Chungcheong region. The voting results from the Chungcheong regional dues-paying party members were announced just a moment ago. We connect with our reporter at the scene.

Reporter Kim Kwan-jin, who took first place?

[Reporter]

I am here at the Daejeon Convention Center, where the Democratic Party's first regional primary has concluded.

Today, August 1, the three candidates—Song Young-gil, Jung Chung-rae, and Kim Min-seok—traveled through Gongju in South Chungcheong Province, Cheongju in North Chungcheong Province, and Daejeon to secure votes in the Chungcheong region.

According to the Chungcheong regional dues-paying members' voting results announced a short while ago, candidate Kim Min-seok took first place with 45.05 percent of the vote.

Candidate Jung Chung-rae followed in second place with 44.61 percent, and candidate Song Young-gil ranked third with 10.34 percent.

[Anchor]

Could you summarize what the candidates said in their speeches?

[Reporter]

All candidates emphasized the success of the Lee Jae-myung administration. However, while candidates Song Young-gil and Kim Min-seok stressed unity between the party and the government and targeted candidate Jung Chung-rae, candidate Jung raised his voice, claiming to be the most reform-minded candidate by completing prosecution reform and other tasks.

Let us listen to the candidates' speeches today.

[Song Young-gil / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate: The Lee Jae-myung administration is being shaken because of individual politics. Whose monopoly is reform supposed to be?]

[Jung Chung-rae / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate: Amid difficulties, we have finally completed prosecution reform with the full abolition of supplementary investigation rights....]

[Kim Min-seok / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate: The extension of the Myung-Jung battle is hell for the Democratic Party, and those gates of hell must be closed.]

[Anchor]

Can we view today's results as a weather vane for the remaining primaries?

[Reporter]

It is true that candidate Kim Min-seok has secured an advantageous position for now by narrowly winning in the Chungcheong region, which is candidate Jung Chung-rae's home region and the first stop of the primaries.

Candidate Kim won by a margin of 0.44 percentage points in the Chungcheong region, which had been considered a relative stronghold for candidate Jung. Previously, candidate Kim stated that if he could limit his deficit to around 7 percentage points behind candidate Jung in the first week of primaries, a late-stage reversal would be possible.

However, candidate Kim achieved a narrow victory by recording a higher vote share in the Chungcheong region than he had anticipated.

That said, there are still five more regional primaries remaining.

In particular, major battlegrounds such as Honam and the Seoul metropolitan area, where the proportion of dues-paying party members is large, are still ahead, making it premature to predict the overall trend.

Tomorrow, the regional primaries will be held in Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam. The contours of whether candidate Kim can maintain his early momentum in the Yeongnam region or whether candidate Jeong will tighten the reins for a comeback are expected to become somewhat clear tomorrow.

(Photo: Yonhap News / Video Reporting: Seol Chi-hwan, Video Editing: Lee Seung-hee)