People Power Party Representative Jang Dong-hyeok arrives at the Supreme Council meeting held at the National Assembly on the 27th. July 27, 2026. [Photo=Yonhap News]

Jang Dong-hyeok, representative of the People Power Party, has bluntly labeled the National Election Commission (NEC), the Democratic Party of Korea, and the judiciary as “accomplices” regarding the infringement of suffrage during the June 3 local elections.

At the Supreme Council meeting held at the National Assembly on the 27th, Representative Jang stated, “The NEC, which refuses to broadcast the proceedings live; the Democratic Party, which is delaying a special counsel investigation requested by the people; and the courts, which are rejecting search warrants for internal messengers, are all accomplices,” adding that “the public will never forgive this.”

Representative Jang was holding each party accountable: the NEC for failing to open the election objection hearings to the public, the Democratic Party for stalling the special counsel investigation into the NEC, and the judiciary for dismissing warrants to search the internal messenger logs and emails of NEC officials.

Representative Jang, who is scheduled to personally attend the oral arguments for the election objection at the NEC that afternoon, criticized the commission, noting that “the NEC ultimately refused the request for a live broadcast.”

He further argued that it is difficult to accept why the hearing process is being kept private when evidence has emerged of not only a shortage of ballots but also circumstances suggesting that NEC staff arbitrarily adjusted the number of voters and turnout figures. He demanded that the NEC explain to the public what it is trying to hide.

Representative Jang also raised concerns regarding the reliability of the NEC's computer network. He argued that if staff were able to arbitrarily change voter counts without following proper reporting and approval procedures, then the security of the computer system, which the NEC has long touted, can no longer be trusted.

He urged a full-scale verification of the entire election computer network, stating, “If it is possible to manipulate computer data regarding voter turnout, then it is possible to manipulate vote counts or anything else.”

Prior to this, after highlighting the issue of “election fraud” at a rally in Daegu on the 25th, Representative Jang wrote on Facebook on the 26th: “People called it a conspiracy theory when we alleged election fraud. Now it has been proven that such claims [by the other side] were the real conspiracy theory.”

He added, “They insisted that computer manipulation was impossible, but now it has been revealed that it is possible.” Through his comments at the Daegu rally, on Facebook, and at the Supreme Council meeting, he has increasingly escalated his rhetoric, characterizing the NEC’s adjustment of digital figures as a case of “election fraud” and demanding a special counsel investigation and comprehensive verification.

The joint investigation team of the prosecution and police has booked one official each from the NEC and the Gyeonggi-do Election Commission as suspects on charges of fabricating public electronic records and obstructing the execution of official duties, and has conducted searches of the NEC’s servers and offices. It is known that circumstances involving the dispersal of excess input voter numbers to other polling stations in two locations in Gyeonggi and one in the Chungcheong region have become subjects of the investigation.

The joint investigation also uncovered evidence that NEC staff discussed so-called “number matching” strategies via internal messengers without reporting the input errors to their superiors. It is reported that these findings were first confirmed through messenger records secured during the search of the NEC last June.

However, the court recently rejected parts of the search warrant requested by the joint investigation team concerning the messenger and email records of NEC staff. While warrants for the servers and offices were issued, the effort to secure communication records that would identify internal discussions, directives, and reporting lines has been stalled.

Supreme Council member Kim Min-soo asked at the meeting, “If the turnout figures were altered, is the vote count safe?” His argument is that if the number of voters was matched not through normal correction procedures but by adjusting figures from other polling stations, then all other computer data that constitutes election results must also be verified by cross-referencing original data with modification records.

The core of this investigation is not merely the existence of simple input errors. It lies in uncovering who became aware of the errors after they occurred, whose judgment led to the omission of proper reporting and approval procedures, and the extent to which the method of adjusting figures from other polling stations was employed.

While one should not jump to conclusions about whether the vote counts for individual candidates were manipulated at this stage, it has become difficult to avoid demands for a thorough examination of all original election network data, input/modification/deletion logs, user access and approval records, and the reporting and directive systems between local and central election commissions, now that evidence of arbitrary adjustment of the baseline voter count has been confirmed.