Min-seok Kim on President Lee: “He's An Easygoing Man”

Editor's Note

This interview took place at 5 p.m. on July 2, 2025, the day before the National Assembly was to vote on Kim Min-seok's confirmation as prime minister.

At the crew's direction, Mr. Kim reclined on a couch styled after a psychiatrist's office. "Come to think of it, this isn't comfortable. It's practically torture," he said. A moment later, he shifted position. "Ah, that's nice." A doll named Jaemi — Korean for "fun" — sat beside him. The conversation lasted 81 minutes.

The transcript remained unpublished for a year. It is published now, after he stepped down as prime minister.The I Ching, the ancient Chinese text of divination, has a phrase for probing beginnings and examining endings: wonsi yojong. The final question of the interview was, "How do you want to be remembered as prime minister?"

1. The Man to Be Prime Minister Tomorrow

Q Please introduce yourself.

In my 20s, I was a student activist and went to prison. I entered politics young, then spent a long time away — about 18 years. I came back, and now I've been nominated for prime minister. Lately, having called a few things right, martial law among them, I've been told I might consider a change of profession.

Q Eighteen years is a long time. What did you do?

I went abroad, studied, taught at universities, worked at N.G.O.s, directed documentaries. Come to think of it, of all the names I went by in those years, my favorite was "Director Kim."

2. "Prime Ministers Never Seemed Like Much"

Q Be honest. Did you want to be prime minister?

Honestly, I hadn't thought much about the job. Prime ministers didn't seem like much. The prime ministers I knew were rarely inspiring. Stodgy, mostly — and even to me, a politician myself, they never gave much sense that they could actually solve anything by talking it through. A prime minister would come to the Assembly, answer questions, and we'd criticize them without much difficulty — it didn't inspire a great deal of respect.
Then I was nominated, and as I went around meeting people, it turned out the prime minister was a big deal. People hold the office in genuine esteem. I thought: this is so important — why did I ever think so little of it?

Q So what would count as success?

The biggest change since martial law is that people have come to feel that politics and their representatives might actually help solve the problems in their lives — that a lawmaker could be their agent in solving them. Trust in the Assembly has gone up, in the numbers. If the same shift happens with the prime minister — "So there's this, too. So he does this kind of thing. So he actually helps solve problems" — that, for me, is success.
I haven't set out to be any particular kind of prime minister. I'll do it my way: all-out, at full speed, several problems at once, talking to people honestly.

"If people start thinking, 'So the prime minister does this kind of thing, too' — that, for me, is success."

3. The Tunnel

Q The youngest lawmaker at 32, the youngest candidate for mayor of Seoul at 38. How is your politics different now?

When I was young, I did fast politics. After the gap, I came back thinking it was better to do politics properly. Direction came to matter more than speed. Not that I'd ever set out to prize speed — I'd just been running fast without noticing.
And what is the direction? Principle and the right path; the people and history. When I can't see the way in the moment, I look to the people. When I can't see it further out, I think of history.

Q And the hardest time?

From the outside, I suppose my hard times look many and long. I've forgotten them all. But I will say this. There was a time when everyone else thought I was finally out of the tunnel, and for me it was where the real tunnel began. So it's hard to judge what was hard and what wasn't.

"The time everyone else thought I was out of the tunnel was, for me, where the real tunnel began."

4. The Problem Solver

Q Let's start with martial law. You called it.

Whatever field I look at, I like to find the thing in it that can become policy or legislation. If I see martial law coming, I think about how to stop it before it happens. So I wrote the laws — the kind that make martial law harder to declare, easier to lift, and that protect the soldiers who refuse to go along.

Q Please walk us through the rest of your legislative record.

I made five-day-a-week lunches at senior centers the law, nationwide. The 1,000-won breakfast for university students. The Nursing Act, one of the great impasses of Korean politics, and cameras in operating rooms — I got those through, too. I once heard out the people who look after stray cats and arranged a meeting for them with the government. During the I.M.F. crisis, I joined the American Chamber of Commerce — probably the only Korean politician ever to do so — and worked on loosening the regulations on foreign-invested companies.
I like doing things of universal use, beyond the usual progressive-conservative divide. I like solving problems. My style is many things at once, and fast.

Q Not just bills. You designed the party's machinery, too.

The 50-50 open primary — half party members, half the general public — that is now simply how Korea picks its presidential candidates: I built that. More recently I proposed the "ten percent rule," giving party members at least a 10 percent say in choosing the floor leader, which until then only lawmakers voted on.
Each time, what I was thinking about was the most practicable, realistic way to reach the ideal. The descriptions of myself I like best are "a realistic idealist," or "the best progress that can actually be achieved." I hate stodginess, I hate being told something can't be done, and I like finding the way it can. I suppose that's an administrator's temperament — which would explain why, after a month of getting my head around the prime minister's job, none of it felt strange.

5. Liberal

Q Kim Min-seok, in one sentence.

At the risk of being misunderstood — I think of myself as a liberal.
If I had to name one person who made me who I am, it's my father, and what my father gave me was total freedom. Rare, for our generation. The only things he ever said to me were "He'll figure it out" and "Figure it out yourself." Not even "Go study."
That liberal streak is at the root of me. I'm used to thinking my own way and reaching my own conclusions; I'm confident in them; and even when I'm wrong, I push on. Which is why, frankly, when I'm working, I often find people in their 20s and 30s more set in their thinking than I am.

Q Does that liberal streak have a downside?

That's the downside. Unless someone beside me grabs hold, I'll keep running forever. So I always tell people: whenever you think I've got it wrong, feel free to say so. Once I've made up my mind, I just go — so it's on you to stop me.

6. The Jovial Debater — On President Lee Jae-myung

Q President Lee Jae-myung, in one sentence.

An easygoing guy. To be precise, a jovial debater.
That's Lee Jae-myung at his most Lee Jae-myung. His strengths show best in a debate. At bottom he's a bright, cheerful, high-spirited person. In a debate he jokes, and carries the joke himself; he isn't put off by disagreement; he doesn't refuse to change his mind when someone else's argument is better; and he enjoys solving the problem. I like that side of him, too.

Q How have the two of you worked together over the years?

In the party, step by step: he was chairman and I was his policy chief; chairman and his campaign war-room chief; chairman and his senior Supreme Council member — until, in effect, I was standing in for him on a good share of party business.
The method never changed. We'd agree on direction, then I'd do most of it freely, and whatever needed his sign-off got his sign-off. That's how we built up a relationship with a fair amount of autonomy in it, learned each other's styles, and got reasonably comfortable.

Q Isn't that a relationship only a Lee loyalist could have?

Loyalty of the forced-fit kind doesn't produce a relationship like that. It works because our directions are similar, and because we align them by arguing it out.
We had a similar philosophy of a party in which the members are sovereign; in elections we both set conservative targets; on policy we both took the realist approach of a center-left party. And politically — my mentor in politics is Kim Dae-jung — we shared the same aim: what's called "addition politics," reaching the centrists and even some conservatives the Democratic Party hadn't traditionally reached.
Temperament, too. We're both the type who like to work a problem out on the ground, by running into it.

Q Now you're president and prime minister. What's the greatest danger?

Communication. We'll be working in separate buildings now and having to stay in step, so we have to make up for that with precision and closeness. The smallest slip in communication, and the responsibility for what follows gets much bigger. We'll have to be far more careful. In the larger sense, though, I'm not worried. You work at it.

"Forced loyalty doesn't build a relationship like that."

7. The National Strategist

Q In your 20s, what was your dream as a politician?

Two things. One was to keep my soul reasonably clear, to the end. The other was to do politics in Korea and then, someday, be secretary general of the United Nations. I wanted to be the international statesman who represented Korea.

Q Does that dream still stand?

If someone told me today to go be secretary general, I think I'd demand U.N. reform. I'd propose changing the order in which the great powers settle things unilaterally in the Security Council, and moving to a system of mutual veto between the General Assembly and the Council. I've been thinking about it for a long time.
I think often about the Korean Wave, too. In the early 2000s, hallyu rose when "Winter Sonata" took off in Japan and "Jewel in the Palace" in China. Now it's a world where if something takes off in Korea, that is the wave. We've reached a point where Korea can say with confidence that its view of America, China, and the peninsula is more accurate than any other country's analysts'. Once, however good the idea, Korea couldn't lead with it. Now, when Korea speaks, people listen.

Q Has Korea been lucky in its leaders?

In its way, yes. They were different sorts, but Park Chung-hee had a feel for the currents of the world, Syngman Rhee saw through the international relations of his day, and so did D.J., the late Kim Dae-jung.
At a gathering of young leaders in Germany, I once said to a friend from Africa: Korea's good fortune is that its dictators were, at least, relatively smart. As opposed to ignorant ones. Of course, along the way there were ignorant ones, too. Yoon Suk Yeol, this last time, is the textbook ignorant dictator.

Q So — in the end, politics for what?

I called myself a liberal a moment ago; on the other side, I'm a national strategist. Honestly, I'm not much interested in what I become. The one reason I've lasted in politics is an interest in national strategy.
I've talked with President Lee about setting the vision as a cultural nation. In our party's terms, D.J. did the politics of culture. Semiconductors, Samsung can lead; biotech, the ecosystem carries; but culture is something every citizen can produce.
On where the world should go and where the nation should go, I'm willing to debate anyone in the world, and I don't think my side of that debate is short on content. Because it's the view from Korea.

"I'm not much interested in what I become. The one reason I've lasted in politics is national strategy."

8. Egen-nam, Karaoke, and a Wig

Q What's your MBTI?

I think I've seen it, but I can't remember it. I don't even know my own type. That kind of thing never sticks.

Q Are you an egen-guy or a teto-guy — an estrogen guy or a testosterone guy?

What's that? [After it is explained.] I'm not sure you can divide men and women that neatly. I'm no alpha male, but I don't sulk and I don't hold grudges, so — the male side, I suppose? [Turning to his aides.] Ah, this one really needs an objective opinion.

Q Are you the adventurous type?

I scare easily. But looking at the record, I don't seem to avoid a challenge. I didn't want to join the student movement — I was frightened. For a year I only watched the demonstrations, and then one day I stood at the very back. That was the start. A few steps in, the riot police blocked the front and the column turned around, and suddenly I was in the front row. And I liked it. You could see the road, and it was easier to run. From then on I always stood in the front row.

Q There's a story that you dressed as a woman while you were on the run.

I had to keep moving. A junior's girlfriend was an art student, and that day's makeup was a woman. Her mother's clothes, a bra, a wig — the works. I got out fine, but that day of all days somebody kept trying to make me talk, and that's how I got caught. I tried to pretend I couldn't speak, but they wouldn't let up. In my 20s I had fair skin, so with a little touching up it wasn't hard.

Q Can you sing?

Without any false-modesty routine: I'm fairly good. I was in the choir. I've sung on the stage at the Seoul Arts Center. My go-to numbers are Kang San-eh's "You Can Do It" and Park Joong-hoon's "Rain and You." Every few months I try to talk my wife into karaoke, and if she won't go, I go alone late at night, do exactly 30 minutes, and come home. It's a way of realigning the body.

Q Give us one line.

Let's say the singing never came up.

Q What time do you get up?

Around four in the morning, usually. Consciously I'm always telling myself to be in bed by ten, but it ends up around midnight. Sleep is my favorite thing in the world, and I can't get it — no time. They say sleep is the best medicine, and it's true. I was never a morning person at all. Somehow it happened.

9. Epilogue — Before Dawn, Today

Q Do you write your own speeches?

Since I ran for student body president in my 20s, every speech and every piece of writing I've considered meaningful, I have written myself. Whether I can keep that up, I don't know. As the days get busier, it may not be possible. But somebody once told me there are two kinds of politicians: the ones who write their own words and the ones who don't. I think that's right. Writing puts your thinking in order, and puts in order the road ahead of you.

Q If you were to send President Lee a video message.

You've had a hard road. But how good it is, to be president and finally able to do the work. This is no longer a personal matter; it's a historic mission — the time to build a great nation, a great people, a great government, a great president. There is no need at all to be afraid of progressing further than we have before, or of becoming greater than the leaders we've had before. I hope you become a greater president than Kim Dae-jung, and I'll do everything I can to help.

Q Last question. When the time comes and you're at the end of your term, how do you want to be remembered as prime minister?

The prime minister who woke the dawn. Up before dawn, thinking about the country, meeting people, getting to work — I'd like to be that kind of prime minister. It just came to me today. Before dawn, this morning.
— The interview took place at 5 p.m. on July 2, 2025, and ran about 81 minutes. The next day, he was confirmed.

Kim Min-seok

Born 1964.

Former president of the Seoul National University student council.

Four-term member of the National Assembly.

Entered the Assembly in 1996, from Yeongdeungpo B, Seoul.

He was 31.

Lost the 2002 Seoul mayoral race to Lee Myung-bak of the Grand National Party.

After a long absence, returned to the Assembly in 2020 — 18 years later.

In 2024, he raised the possibility of martial law.

On Dec. 3 of that year, martial law was declared.

In 2025, he was named the first prime minister of the Lee Jae-myung government.

“I’ll be the prime minister who woke the dawn.”

He said it to The New Paper, before he was confirmed.

In June 2026, he announced his intention to resign.

His politics turned back toward the party.