Old photo misrepresented as Lee Jae Myung's recent vacation
Text seen in the screenshot reads: "The president is on vacation, Lee Jae Myung and first lady Kim Hye Kyung" and "Watersports are best when the country is flooded."
The post surfaced as torrential rains triggered flooding and caused damage across parts of South Korea (archived link).
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Screenshot of the misleading Facebook post, captured August 4, 2025. Orange X added by AFP
Other posts sharing the same image suggest it was taken as Lee is on summer leave from August 4 to 8 in the coastal South Gyeongsang province, South Korean newspaper Hankyoreh reported, citing the presidential office (archived link).
"People are dying and this guy is photographed in a swimsuit, how can we call him our leader," reads one comment left in the post. Another comment reads, "The economy is dying and people are suffering but he chooses to take a swim."
But the photo is old and does not show Lee on holiday in 2025.
Combined reverse image and keyword searches show the same picture was posted to Lee's verified Facebook account on August 28, 2017 (archived link).
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Screenshot comparison between the photo shared with the misleading claim (left) and the original photo posted in August 2017 on Lee's Facebook page (right)
In the caption, he wrote about filming for the reality show "Same Bed, Different Dreams," a program featuring celebrity couples which aired that month on SBS (archived link).
A segment from the show available on YouTube shows Lee and Kim wearing the same swimsuits while surfing at the beach (archived link).
At the time, Lee was serving as mayor of Seongnam, a city south of Seoul.
Similar photos of the couple at the beach were also published in multiple local reports about the TV program at the time (archived here and here).
Lee is a frequent target of disinformation online which AFP previously debunked multiple times.
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