President Lee Accepts Resignations of Jung Woo Ha and Eunsoo Jeon for By-Election Bids: "A Major Decision"

Ha Jungwoo, Chief of AI Future Planning (left), and Jeon Eunsoo, spokesperson, are entering the Blue House reception room where a meeting is being held between President Lee Jae-myung and Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind, on April 27, 2026. Photo by Yonhap News Agency

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On the morning of April 28, President Lee Jae-myung accepted the resignation of Jung Woo Ha, Chief AI Future Planning Officer at the Blue House. This comes just one day after Ha expressed his intention to step down. With this, Ha will run as the ruling party's candidate in the by-election, approximately 10 months after being appointed to the Blue House.

According to Blue House officials, Ha tendered his resignation after President Lee's meeting with Demis Hassabis, co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind, concluded the previous day.

Ha plans to run in the Buk-gu Gap district of Busan in the local elections on June 3. The Buk-gu Gap seat became vacant after Jeon Jae-soo, a lawmaker from the Democratic Party of Korea, announced his bid for mayor of Busan. Ha is expected to officially declare his candidacy soon and begin full-scale preparations for the campaign.

The ruling party had been urging Ha to run. On the evening of April 26, party leader Jeong Cheong-rae personally met with Ha, saying, "Aren't you the architect of the policy to make Korea one of the top three AI powerhouses? You should complete this blueprint through legislation in the National Assembly." It is reported that Ha made up his mind on this day.

Ha graduated from Gudeok High School in Busan and Seoul National University's Department of Computer Engineering, and earned a doctorate in electrical and computer engineering from Seoul National University. He previously served as Head of the AI Innovation Center at Naver Cloud and as head of the CLOVA AI Lab at Naver. Last year, when the Lee Jae-myung administration was inaugurated, he was appointed to the newly created post of Chief AI Future Planning Officer at the Blue House and has since led key AI policy initiatives.

President Lee "respects the difficult decision" and "gladly accepted" Ha's resignation, according to Kang Yoo-jung, Chief Spokesperson for the Blue House. President Lee added, "Whatever work you do and wherever you are, I hope you will continue to serve the nation and the people," before finalizing the approval.

Meanwhile, President Lee also approved the resignation of spokesperson Eunsoo Jeon. Jeon is expected to run for the Chungnam Asan-eul district, the constituency of Kang Hoon-sik, Chief Presidential Secretary. Chief Spokesperson Kang explained, "The resignations of Blue House spokesperson Eunsoo Jeon and Vice Minister of Oceans and Fisheries Kim Seong-beom have also been approved."

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