Democrats Attack Cho Kuk Over Call Not to Push Lee’s Indictment Withdrawals: “He’s Trying to Prove He Still Matters”

Cho Kuk’s warning that the government should not rush to withdraw indictments involving President Lee Jae-myung has drawn a sharp rebuke from members of the Democratic Party, his former political allies.

Cho, head of the Korea Innovation Party’s policy research institute, said on Facebook that lawmakers should approach a proposed special counsel bill with caution. The bill would investigate the prosecution’s investigations and indictments during the Yoon Suk Yeol government, including cases involving Lee.

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If the government pushes ahead with withdrawing President Lee’s indictments while ignoring this process, it can only end in political and legal disaster.

Cho argued that a law must not appear to have been written for one particular person. If prosecutors want to withdraw indictments on the grounds that they were fabricated, he said, authorities must first confirm the fabrication. He called for disciplinary reviews by the Justice Ministry or Supreme Prosecutors’ Office, and an investigation by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials. He also said the government should review the findings of a Justice Ministry committee examining the facts of cases involving Lee.

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You are a responsible politician, not a professor.

Cho said Justice Minister nominee Kim Seung-won should produce visible results quickly after taking office. “If the government pushes ahead with withdrawing President Lee’s indictments while ignoring this process, it can only end in political and legal disaster,” he wrote. He also noted that under the Criminal Procedure Act, an indictment can be withdrawn only before the first-trial verdict. Even if a prosecutor withdrew an indictment in a case pending before an appellate court, Cho said, the court could ask the Constitutional Court to review the special counsel law.

Democratic lawmakers responded angrily. Park Ji-won said Cho was “beating a drum out of nowhere” and told him that he was a responsible politician, not a professor, who should understand that politics sometimes requires waiting or taking a detour. Park Sun-won said politicians should hold to basic principles when the world feels difficult. Song Young-gil told SBS radio that he understood Cho’s intervention as an effort by a politician to confirm his own existence.

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I understand it as a politician continuing to work to confirm his own existence.