Exit poll shows liberal candidate Lee forecast to win South Korean election
The poll comes two months after his rival and then-conservative president Yoon Suk Yeol was removed from office over his short-lived imposition of martial law.
The exit poll by South Korea's three major TV stations – KBS, MBC and SBS – showed Mr Lee projected to obtain 51.7% of the total votes cast, beating conservative candidate Kim Moon Soo on 39.3%.
Pre-election surveys also suggested Mr Lee appeared headed for an easy win, riding on deep public frustration over the conservatives in the wake of Mr Yoon's martial law debacle.
Mr Kim has struggled to win over moderate, swing voters as his People Power Party remains in a quagmire of internal feuding over how to view Mr Yoon's actions.
The election serves as another defining moment in the country's resilient democracy, but observers worry a domestic divide worsened after Mr Yoon's martial law stunt is far from over and could pose a big political burden on the new president.
The past six months saw large crowds of people rallying in the streets to either denounce or support Mr Yoon, while a leadership vacuum caused by Mr Yoon's impeachment and ensuing formal dismissal rattled the country's high-level diplomatic activities and financial markets.
The winning candidate will immediately be sworn in as president on Wednesday for a single, full term of five years without the typical two-month transition period.
The new president will face major challenges including a slowing economy, US president Donald Trump's America-first policies and North Korea's evolving nuclear threats.
Voting began at 6am local time at 14,295 polling stations nationwide, with polls closing at 8pm. Observers say the winner could be announced as early as midnight.
More than 19 million people had cast their ballots, according to the National Election Commission's tally as of 8.20pm. Combined with the 15 million who voted during last week's two-day early voting period, voter turnout stood at 78.4%. South Korea has 44.4 million eligible voters.
In a Facebook posting on Tuesday, Mr Lee, whose Democratic Party led the legislative effort to oust Mr Yoon, called for voters to 'deliver a stern and resolute judgment' against the conservatives over martial law.
In one of his final campaign speeches on Monday, Mr Lee argued that a win by Mr Kim would mean the 'the return of the rebellion forces, the destruction of democracy and the deprival of people's human rights'.
He also promised to revitalise the economy, reduce inequality and ease national divisions.
Mr Kim, a former labour minister under Mr Yoon, warned that a Lee win would allow him to wield excessive power, launch political retaliation against opponents and legislate laws to protect him from various legal troubles, as his party already controls parliament.
Mr Lee 'is now trying to seize all power in South Korea and establish a Hitler-like dictatorship,' Mr Kim told a rally in the south-eastern city of Busan.
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Daily Mail
4 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Trump's inks order on US drones after Ukraine's shock attack on Russia while encouraging flying cars
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The Independent
6 hours ago
- The Independent
You can now bet on the next steps in the Trump-Musk fallout and when they will have their first meeting
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The Sun
7 hours ago
- The Sun
What caused Trump & Elon Musk's explosive fallout? – from NASA spat to key role of Don's teen relative, I know the truth
THE richest man in the world going toe-to-toe with the most powerful man on the planet . . . what could possibly go wrong? And has the most outlandish politician in American history finally met his match? 7 7 7 From the moment neuro-diverse rocket man Elon Musk backed New York real estate heavy Donald J. Trump to return to the White House, the smart money was on these two galactic-sized egos falling out. I hear it's the galaxy and beyond that has been at the centre of their tensions, but more on that later — as last night Washington was awash with claims Musk's attempts to befriend Kai Trump, the 18-year-old future golf star granddaughter of the President, also played a hefty part in the atomic row. 'Bankrupting America is not OK – kill the bill' But the powerful pair certainly have fallen out, trading public blows on their social media sites of choice — the very tech platforms that have both made them and could yet see them crash to back down to earth. 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Musk raged on social media: 'This spending bill contains the largest increase in the debt ceiling in US history! It is the Debt Slavery Bill… Call your Senator, Call your Congressman, Bankrupting America is NOT ok! KILL the BILL.' It's a long cry from when Musk toured the swing states at last year's election telling the world that Trump was the greatest thing since sliced bread and organising well-oiled get-out-the-vote operations. But behind the scenes I'm told Trump was already at the end of his tether with Musk who some sources accuse of 'gurning away' on the campaign trail and in meetings. Brought in to help slash costs through his Department of Government Efficiency, tensions reached a head after the New York Times ran a well-sourced hit piece accusing Musk of enjoying recreational drugs such as ketamine and ecstasy throughout his brief foray into politics. Those claims were not denied when Musk was confronted by Fox News in an Oval Office press conference last week. Musk's coterie of love-children and his stated desire to help repopulate the planet with, what his former lovers have claimed, he calls genius offspring have also rubbed Trump up the wrong way. Teetotal Trump wanted rid of him but also wanted to give his big donor a decent goodbye, so lavished praise on him after he departed as special government employee last week. Yet despite all the niceties, the former allies are locked in a Cold War stand-off this weekend. Will they both retreat to their bunkers and realise mutually assured destruction is in neither of their interests, OR will they be unable to help themselves and launch a thermonuclear blow-out that burns them both up? Musk came close to that on Friday night, with his outlandish allegations that the President was sitting on files about billionaire deceased paedo-financier Jeffrey Epstein — because Trump himself is named as a murky connection. White House sources say that is nonsense and were that bombshell evidence to be sitting in a government file somewhere, surely previous Democrat governments would have leaked it by now. Musk ended his online diatribe with calls for Trump to be impeached, adding a menacing suggestion he could back the Democrats. Yet even some of his closest allies and supporters were left begging any friend possible to strip Musk of access to his own X platform before he caused any more damage. It's a dangerous game for the mercurial billionaire to play — because the President hit back that he was going to suspend US subsidies and government contracts for the entrepreneurs' many, many firms. Musk's electric car firm Tesla shares were down 14 per cent yesterday — the biggest one-day drop since the company went public, wiping $152billion off its value. And that's before the $3billion personal hit to Musk on the back of an evening of lively tweeting. In a further snub, Trump was last night considering selling his own Tesla which has spent weeks parked outside the Oval Office, in a move which could spark a wave of similar fire sales across the US amongst his fans. 'Musk is an illegal alien and should be deported' The Tesla Cybertruck gifted to the President's granddaughter Kai is presumably for the chop too. Meanwhile, the row threatens to spark a wider war between various right-wing camps that run Washington, with implications felt in Congress and across the political spectrum. Devout Trump-backer Steve Bannon called for South African-born Musk to be deported from the US, saying yesterday: 'They should initiate a formal investigation of his immigration status because I am of the strong belief that he is an illegal alien and should be deported from the country immediately.' 7 Meanwhile, the self-proclaimed autistic automaker said he could launch a new political party — an idea backed by 80 per cent of the millions of respondents to his social media poll yesterday. But this wasn't just a political knife-fight but also a brawl in the casino of capitalism. In short, it's a mess, but one that was very obviously cooking. Musk is a libertarian, free-marketeer who has his sights on the moon and Mars and beyond. Trump is the tariff-loving protectionist who believes it's America First and everyone else can fall in line behind that. Prior to SpaceX, they couldn't even transport their own astronauts to the International Space Station and had to rely on outdated Russian rockets Dr Rainer Zitelmann Add to that their tensions on China that Trump sees as an existential threat to the US, while Musk views it as an opportunity to produce his electric cars on the cheap. It's amazing that things took so long to come to a head. And then it came down to space, where Musk obviously has a major financial interest as the boss of SpaceX — the rocket firm hat has all but colonised America's space projects. As top economist Dr Rainer Zitelmann puts it: 'Without SpaceX, the US does not currently have much to offer. "Prior to SpaceX, they couldn't even transport their own astronauts to the International Space Station and had to rely on outdated Russian rockets — and paid exorbitant prices to do so. 'SpaceX is responsible for 86 per cent of all US launches.' But things were coming to a head when Trump blocked a Musk ally to take over Nasa last month, infuriating his former 'First Buddy'. Moment of maximum danger Insiders say Musk's attempts to take over Nasa were a step too far that left America's future security beholden to a private company run by a wildly unpredictable boss. Sources claimed Musk recently had his high-level security clearances revoked by the White House as tensions mounted, leading to Friday's pyrotechnics. What happens next is a moment of maximum danger for Trump. Brits will be familiar with what happens when a leader and their dangerous right-hand man fall out. Boris Johnson found out the hard way that if the snubbed guru bears enough of a grudge, it is fatal. The White House will be hoping this weekend that Elon holds less resentment than equally unstable Dominic Cummings — who spent the year after his No10 ousting doing all he could to unseat and destabilise his former boss. I wonder whether that might be a bit of wishful thinking . . .
