Jeong Chungrae: "Democratic Party Has Tens of Billions in Reserve... Election Deposit Should Return to Last Party Convention Level"

Even if you catch wild rabbits, losing the house rabbits means failure in general and presidential elections

President Lee's comments on the deposit via social media are his opinion as a party member

The flood of donations reflects the anger

Chung Cheong-rae, a former leader of the Democratic Party of Korea and a candidate in the party leadership race, spoke about the recently controversial election deposit, saying, "It's too high," and adding, "I hope it can be lowered to the level of last year's party convention or previous standards."

Appearing on MBC Radio's "Kim Jong-bae's Insight" on July 20, Chung said, "I didn't realize the deposit had increased this much. After looking into it, I heard, 'There are too many candidates now, and the actual costs have gone up.' I think that's why it was increased accordingly." He continued, "When I was the party leader, the Democratic Party had plenty of funds—there were tens of billions of won in the party's accounts. Even the President said we should conduct elections in line with the public election system, so I think the party should bear the costs."

Chung Cheong-rae, former leader of the Democratic Party of Korea

Concerning the party's finances, Chung said, "To my knowledge, there is about 50 billion won available. As the number of party members increases, more people are paying membership dues. That's why the party finances are in good shape." He went on to add, "I also hope the deposit can be reduced further."

Regarding President Lee Jae-myung's remarks on this issue via social networking services (SNS), Chung said, "I see it as an expression of opinion from a party member." He added, "I just want the deposit reduced as is, and since the party has enough money, it would be better for the party to shoulder some of the burden instead of the candidates. Isn't that a positive intention?"

Chung also explained the recent influx of sponsorship donations, saying, "It was an expression of the members' anger, so to speak." He continued, "Because of the local elections this year, the donation limit is 300 million won, but with 280 million won already raised, there was only 20 million won left. Once that was filled, we opened a separate sponsorship account for party leadership candidates with a 150 million won limit, but in one night, 380 million won came in. Because of the holidays, we couldn't close the bank account, and another 60 million won was deposited." He explained, "The average amount was about 46,000 won, with more than 8,000 donors. We had to call each one to check their account numbers and send the excess money back."

Regarding so-called pro-Chung supreme council members, he addressed the messages shared among party members to split their support for candidates based on birthdays, saying, "It's something that's always happened for a long time. Members are spontaneously coming up with their own strategies."

Meanwhile, Chung commented, "'No matter how many new voters you attract, if you lose your core base, the general election and presidential race will be hopeless.' There's that anxiety, or if put strongly, even fear." With this, he reiterated his belief in the importance of maintaining the Democratic Party's core supporters, especially concerning issues like prosecutorial reform. However, regarding author Yoo Si-min's remarks on "expansion and reconstruction," Chung said, "No comment."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.