The Biggest Hot Issue in the 21st National Assembly's First 100 Days Is Not 'Supplementary Budget' but 'Choo Mi-ae'

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Ji-eun] The issue maker who dominated the first four months of the 21st National Assembly was none other than Minister of Justice Chu Mi-ae. While the ruling party was focused on protecting Minister Chu, the opposition party took to criticizing her, resulting in a lack of cooperation in the early stages. Online big data searches also revealed that the issue surrounding Minister Chu overwhelmingly attracted public attention compared to other National Assembly-related issues.

An analysis of keywords related to the 21st National Assembly, including ▲Chu Mi-ae ▲Supplementary Budget (Chugyeong) ▲Multiple Homeowners ▲Green New Deal, was conducted from June 1, when the 21st National Assembly began, until September 29, just before the Chuseok holiday, using Google Trends. The investigation on the 6th showed that keywords related to Minister Chu drew the most attention.

From May 31 to June 6, right after the start of the 21st National Assembly, the interest level for the keyword 'Chu Mi-ae' was 1, while the interest level for 'Chugyeong' was 8, showing that interest in the supplementary budget was eight times higher. However, from mid-June, the interest levels for the two keywords became similar. This was when Minister Chu was confronting Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-yeol over the 'Han Myeong-sook case investigation cover-up.' Subsequently, as the conflict between Minister Chu and Prosecutor General Yoon escalated over the investigative directive authority and a controversy arose over the leak of a related draft, the interest level for the keyword 'Chu Mi-ae' jumped to 33. Compared to the interest levels of 6 for 'Chugyeong' and 'Multiple Homeowners' during the same period, this was five times higher.

After the investigative directive issue was settled and the interest in 'Chu Mi-ae' gradually decreased, it surged again due to allegations regarding her son's military service. Despite Minister Chu's remark of 'You're writing fiction' at the Judiciary Committee on July 27, which did not elicit much reaction, interest dramatically changed at the end of August when testimony from a duty soldier about the minister's son's leave allegations emerged. In the second week of September, the interest level soared to 100, three times the highest level in July. During the same period, although the ruling and opposition parties reached an agreement on the supplementary budget, the interest level was only 10, just one-tenth of that for Minister Chu.

The public's attention was drawn more to the minister's family 'scandal' than to livelihood economy keywords. In the case of the keyword 'Multiple Homeowners,' interest briefly spiked in early to mid-July due to controversies involving multiple homeowners among politicians from both parties and the government's July 10 real estate measures, but interest gradually waned. The 'Green New Deal,' which was actively promoted by the government and ruling party, had the lowest interest level. Although President Moon Jae-in emphasized the 'Green New Deal' in his National Assembly opening speech on July 16, public interest did not significantly increase.

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