President Lee Jae-myung will invite the leadership and lawmakers of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea to the presidential office in succession ahead of the regular parliamentary session in September. The moves aim to swiftly patch up the internal party conflict that surfaced during the Aug. 17 national convention while realigning a party-government "one team" structure to back the legislation and budget for key state affairs in the administration's second year in power.
According to the presidential office and the Democratic Party on the 23rd, President Lee will invite all Democratic Party lawmakers to the guest house at the presidential office for lunch on the 28th. The lawmakers plan to head to the presidential office after wrapping up a two-day workshop in Incheon, starting on the 27th, to prepare for the regular session. As with last year, the final item on the lawmakers' workshop schedule will effectively be a lunch with the president.
Ahead of that, President Lee will host a dinner on the 25th for the Democratic Party's new leadership, including party leader Kim Min-seok and floor leader Han Byung-do. The day before the dinner with the president, Kim is reported to be holding a separate meeting with People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyeok at the National Assembly. It will be the first bilateral meeting between the two party leaders since the emergency martial law of Dec. 3, 2024. The schedule shows the new ruling party leadership meeting the president to discuss regular-session strategy and key legislative tasks immediately after an initial round of talks with the opposition.
In particular, President Lee held a dinner on the 19th, just two days after the convention, bringing together Kim and lawmakers Jeong Cheong-rae and Song Young-gil, who had competed for party leadership. After gathering the leadership rivals in one place right after the convention, Lee is moving quickly to build "one team Democratic Party" by widening contact from the new leadership to all lawmakers.
Lee Gyu-jeong, a research professor at Korea University's Institute for Peace and Democracy, said, "President Lee's frequent communication and personal engagement with the ruling party is a move to block the sparks of internal factional conflict early ahead of the regular session, while at the same time solidifying party-government unity to push state affairs and reform legislation."
Both inside and outside the presidential office, the series of meetings is seen as reflecting President Lee's will to swiftly patch up the internal party conflict that surfaced during the convention. Lee's personal push for party unity right after the new leadership took office is read as a bid to minimize policy and legislative discord between the party and the government ahead of the regular session in September. It also assumes a judgment that the pace of legislation in the National Assembly must be raised further in the administration's second year, given that many bills to support key state affairs were delayed at the parliamentary gate over the past year.
Indeed, when a revision to the National Assembly Act shortening the maximum processing period for fast-track bills from 330 days to 90 days recently passed a plenary session, President Lee shared a related article on X, formerly Twitter, expressing anticipation that "I am truly glad that things will move swiftly." Amid a recognition that state achievements in the second year in power will inevitably hinge on the National Assembly's legislative speed, the successive party-government meetings ahead of the regular session are read as a move to maximize legislative momentum under the banner of "one team."
This is assessed to have a different tone from the lunch to which all lawmakers were invited last August. The emphasis of last year's lunch, held less than three months into his term, was on advancing the new government's state agenda. At last year's lunch, President Lee said, "I am giving everything I have to state affairs," urging the National Assembly's role and the pursuit of reform tasks, and then-leader Jeong Cheong-rae expressed his intent to support the success of the Lee Jae-myung government. In the early days, it strongly bore the character of party-government cohesion aimed at speeding up the pursuit of reform tasks by the government and the ruling party.
By contrast, this year "results" achieved through cohesion have become more important than cohesion itself. Professor Lee said, "As we enter the second year in power, we must go beyond presenting a policy blueprint and produce results that the public can feel," diagnosing that "this is a more complex situation, where legislative results beyond party unity are needed and factional conflict is added on top." To support livelihood issues such as real estate and tax reform, as well as future growth-engine policies for semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI) data centers and physical AI, the ruling party's legislative and budget support in the regular session is essential.
The problem is that even though the convention is over, the embers of internal party conflict have not been fully extinguished. As soon as Kim named the youth and labor supreme council members, pro-Jeong faction supreme council members — Choi Min-hee, Han Min-soo and Lee Sung-yoon — objected and boycotted the vote, and such discord within the party continued even after the convention. Since then, the mood has been to refrain from further open clashes, but it is seen as too early to say the pro-Jeong faction's objections have been fully patched up. If factional conflict continues, it could weigh on the party's and government's ability to drive state affairs in the regular session. Against this backdrop, Lee's widening of contact with the party is interpreted as a move to personally end the internal conflict and re-consolidate the party's capacity around state governance.
Seo Yong-ju, head of the Mac Institute for Political and Social Research, predicted, "How quickly the aftereffects of the convention are resolved and the ruling party is focused on livelihood and reform legislation and budget processing will be the first test of the state's driving force in the second year in power."
