Kim Moon-soo (74), a candidate for the People Power Party primary, was finally elected as the party's presidential candidate on the 3rd. Kim, who spans from the first generation of labor movements in the 1970s to the 'asphalt right,' is a politician with a rare political trajectory.
Born in 1951 in Yeongcheon, North Gyeongsang Province, as the sixth of seven siblings, Kim spent his childhood in a shantytown. He entered Seoul National University’s College of Business Administration in 1970 after attending Kyungbuk Middle School and Kyungbuk High School.
During his university years, Kim participated in the student activist group 'Underdeveloped Country Social Research Society' and was expelled twice due to involvement in the nationwide student protests in 1971 and the Mincheonghakryun incident in 1974. He graduated 25 years later.
After his expulsion, Kim started working at a clothing factory in Cheonggyecheon as a cutter assistant from 1972, actively engaging in the labor movement. He joined the Korean Metal Workers' Union, where he served as the union president, delving deeply into labor activism.
During the Chun Doo-hwan regime, he also served as the executive director of the Jeon Tae-il Memorial Committee. In 1986, he was arrested on charges of leading the 5.3 Incheon Democratic Uprising and spent two years in prison.
At that time, Kim's presence among activists was significant. The mother of martyr Jeon Tae-il, Lee So-seon, was reported to have called Kim "my son" during her lifetime, and former Justice Party leader Sim Sang-jung recalled that "Kim Moon-soo, during the time we were comrades, was a legend."
Kim shifted to conservatism in the early 1990s while witnessing the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Kim entered politics through the People's Party, which he founded in 1990 with former lawmakers Lee Jae-o and Jang Gi-pyo, and later joined the Democratic Liberal Party (the predecessor of the People Power Party) in 1994 at the encouragement of then-chairman Kim Young-sam.
He began a formal political career after being elected as a member of the National Assembly in the 1996 15th general election. Kim successfully won three consecutive terms in the 15th, 16th, and 17th National Assemblies and was re-elected as governor of Gyeonggi Province.
However, after a 2011 incident during his governorship when he called 119 to demand public disclosure of identities, a political decline began.
In the 2012 presidential election, he announced his candidacy in the Saenuri Party primary but finished second to candidate Park Geun-hye. He then spent nearly a decade out of the spotlight after consecutive defeats in the 2016 20th general election and the 2018 Seoul mayoral election.
Kim, who had been active as a conservative, returned to the political stage under the Yoon Suk-yeol administration. In this administration, he served as the chair of the Economic, Social and Labor Committee and the Minister of Employment and Labor.
During his term as a member of the cabinet, Kim gained attention for his strong remarks and emerged as a presidential hopeful.
In particular, during last year's urgent National Assembly questioning, when a Democratic Party lawmaker demanded an apology to the public regarding the declaration of martial law, Kim alone refused while other cabinet members, including then-Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, stood and bowed 90 degrees.
▲Born in 1951 in Yeongcheon, North Gyeongsang Province (74) ▲Kyungbuk Middle School, Kyungbuk High School ▲Seoul National University, College of Business Administration ▲Member of the National Assembly for the 15th, 16th, and 17th terms ▲Governor of Gyeonggi Province, 32nd and 33rd terms ▲Chair of the Economic, Social and Labor Committee ▲Minister of Employment and Labor