The Democratic Party’s arrogance in full swing

We urge the DP to demonstrate the spirit of compromise, not arrogance, before it’s too late.

The majority Democratic Party (DP) is poised to pass a number of controversial bills before the 21st National Assembly expires on May 29. The DP plans to submit two bills — a special act on investigating the suspicious death of a Marine on a rescue mission last year and a special act on punishing jeonse fraud — after opening a plenary session on Thursday. The liberal party is also pushing for the passage of a revision to the Grain Management Act, which was vetoed by President Yoon Suk Yeol, and a revision to the Nursing Act and a special act on investigating the first lady’s alleged corruption.

But the DP and the governing People Power Party (PPP) on Wednesday agreed to jointly deal with a special act on investigating the Itaewon tragedy, which the president had vetoed. Both sides reportedly agreed to accept the DP’s position on the formation of a special investigation committee and its activity period, while respecting the PPP’s demand for lesser authority for the committee.

Nevertheless, the two parties didn’t take a step back from other hotly contested bills. National Assembly speaker Kim Jin-pyo wants to convene a full meeting of the legislature if the two sides reach an agreement. But the DP is pressuring the speaker to open a plenary session on Thursday by threatening that its floor leader will not accompany him on his trip to United States starting Saturday.

The DP’s rush to railroad volatile bills before the expiration of the legislature’s current term is disappointing, given the significance of the long-awaited meeting on Monday between the president and DP leader Lee Jae-myung to help break the ongoing political deadlock. The DP apparently aims to shake the government until the last minute.

Given the minority status of the PPP, the DP will try to domineer over the governing party over the next four years. If the DP and the new Rebuilding Korea Party join forces to attack the PPP, it will only deepen the political divide. Under such circumstances, multi-term lawmakers of the majority party are engrossed in rallying peers’ support for their bid for the next Assembly speaker.

That’s not all. On a YouTube channel, Park Jie-won, the oldest lawmaker-elect in the upcoming legislature, hurled insults at the current speaker for leaving the country “even without putting to a vote the special act on looking into the suspicious death of the Marine.” Park called the speaker “a son of a bitch.”

If politicians behave in such shameful ways, voters will judge them in the next election. If the DP thinks it can pass any bills it wants to pass after being buoyed by the majority it won in the last election, that’s a serious miscalculation. We urge the DP to demonstrate the spirit of compromise, not arrogance, before it’s too late.