A President’s Open Door: Lee Jae-myung’s Fierce Defense of Transparent Cabinet Meetings The political morning broke quietly in Seoul on October 16, but President Lee Jae-myung was already preparing for a fight — not against the opposition, but against a narrative building in the press that threatened to undermine one of his administration’s proudest pillars. At issue was the decision to keep Cabinet meetings open to the public, a policy that has divided opinion since its introduction. Earlier, on October 15, he had been photographed speaking at a meeting of senior presidential secretaries at Cheong Wa Dae, looking every bit…

On the morning of October 16, President Lee Jae-myung stepped away from the formal podium and chose a more personal platform—his social media account—to address a controversy that had been simmering in Seoul’s political circles. The message, titled “On the Controversy Over Making Cabinet Meetings Public,” began with an expression of deep regret. He was frustrated not simply by criticism, but by what he called “false claims”: the suggestion that broadcasting Cabinet meetings was silencing ministers and preventing them from speaking honestly. The origin of the dispute was a series of media reports from October 15, which alleged that at…