Right-wing YouTuber blamed for botching up battleground election

Lawyer Kang Yong-seok holds a banner reading “Travel ban for Lee Jun-seok” during a news conference in front of Seoul Prosecutors' Office in southern Seoul on May 30. Kang, also a conservative YouTuber, ran unsuccessfully in the Gyeonggi gubernatorial election held on Wednesday. Yonhap

Different kind of blame game under way in ruling party over Gyeonggi election results

By Kang Hyun-kyung

The main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) is not the only political establishment that has been embroiled in a post-election blame game following its crushing defeat in Wednesday's local elections.

Plenty of second-guessing, remorse and belated what ifs have erupted inside the ruling People Power Party (PPP) after the elections. Its candidate Kim Eun-hye's defeat in the highly-contested Gyeonggi gubernatorial election by a razor-thin margin has triggered soul-searching among some sympathetic ruling party members to figure out if her defeat was inevitable.

Kim lost the election due to an upset victory by her rival Kim Dong-yeon of the DPK, thanks to an abrupt surge in votes supporting him after 97 percent of all ballots cast were already tallied. The difference in votes won by the two Kims was only 0.15 percentage point, or 8,900 votes. The tiny gap by which the DPK's Kim won the gubernatorial election has been a painful reminder for the conservatives.

Hong Joon-pyo, the governor-elect of Daegu Metropolitan City, pointed the finger at the conservative candidate Kang Yong-seok as the main culprit behind PPP candidate Kim's defeat.

“A far-right YouTuber has ruined the Gyeonggi election and this is one of the most regrettable parts,” Hong wrote on his Facebook.

In his social media post, he singled out four “incidents” that held back the PPP, which otherwise “would have done a lot better” in Wednesday's elections. Kang is one of the troublemakers responsible for the PPP's underperformance, according to Hong.

Hong stopped short of directly mentioning Kang as the one responsible for Kim's defeat. But it was obvious who the governor-elect was referring to, as he said the person he is blaming is a YouTuber who ran in the election. Kang is the only candidate that met these conditions.

Kang, a lawyer and a former lawmaker, is an influential YouTuber among ultra conservatives. He regularly appeared in the news channel, Hoverlab, and presented his views about political issues and current affairs.

Kang ran in the election as an independent candidate after the PPP's leadership rejected his request to rejoin the party to and receive its blessing to run in the gubernatorial election. He declared his bid right away to run in the election as an independent, causing worries among some conservative voters about a possible vote split and its possible negative impact on the ruling party. The ruling party and Kang both faced calls to field a unified candidate, which did not happen.

Kang ran to the finish, earning some 54,000 votes. That was much more than the 8,901 votes that led to the PPP's Kim to lose the election.

Kim Eun-hye, center, a former lawmaker who ran unsuccessfully in the Gyeonggi gubernatorial election on the ticket of the conservative People Power Party, is seen at the campaign rally in Gunpo City, Gyeonggi Province on May 29. Yonhap

Some ruling party members belatedly began to ask what would have happened if Kang had dropped out of the race to support Kim or if the party had agreed to field a unified candidate based on a fair competition.

PPP floor leader Kweon Seong-dong is one of the lawmakers who regretted the vote split.

“I kind of second-guessed the election result and thought about what would have happened if there was a single conservative candidate,” he said on a radio program. “The exit poll said our party's candidate Kim was slightly ahead of the DPK candidate, albeit within a margin of error. But her rival had an upset win after all votes were counted. The small margin that made Kim lose out in the election made me sad.”

Inside the ruling party, however, there is a group of people who think differently. They are skeptical about the election results even though a single candidate was fielded. According to them, the PPP would have suffered a lot in its image if the ruling party had intervened in negotiations to field a unified candidate between Kim and Kang, mainly because of Kang's image as a far-rightist. His possible presence in the PPP's campaign as either a candidate or a supporter would have dealt a serious blow to the party's image. And as a result, centrists or center-right voters would have withdrawn their support for the conservative party.

Kang was critical of the PPP for criticizing him.

“Simply put, they had the wrong candidate and that's why they lost in the Gyeonggi gubernatorial election. That's it!” he said on his YouTube channel. “Are there anyone who believed that Kim Eun-hye is governor material? It is Kim herself who is responsible for her defeat in the election. Don't blame others.”

A recent Gallup poll found that Kim Eun-hye's defeat in the election is viewed by the public as the most regrettable part of the local elections. The survey shows that 22 percent of respondents answered that they sympathized with Kim after her loss in the election. The DPK's Seoul mayoral candidate Song Young-gil (7 percent) came in second. The poll was taken on June 2 of 1,001 people across the nation.