Lee’s chief of staff falls on sword after 2 failed Cabinet nominees, sinking approval

President Lee Jae Myung and the Blue House chief of staff, Kang Hoon-sik, attend a Cabinet meeting at the presidential office in Seoul on Sept. 21, 2026. (Yonhap)

Korean President Lee Jae Myung’s chief of staff offered to step down on Monday to take responsibility for the poor vetting of two failed Cabinet nominees and the president’s plummeting approval rating.

“Kang Hoon-sik tendered his resignation to President Lee this morning,” said Seong Ghi-hong, the presidential secretary for public relations and communication, during a briefing on Monday.

It has been a year and three months since Kang became Lee’s first chief of staff in June last year.

“Considering that President Lee repeatedly said during the press conference last week that his own shortcomings were to blame for the public’s view of his administration, Kang, as the president’s chief of staff, offered to resign to take overall responsibility,” a Blue House official explained.

Lee told his senior aides in a meeting on Monday that he has yet to decide whether to accept Kang’s resignation.

“This has been an exhausting time for many people, the chief of staff included,” he said.

Kang’s resignation offer was precipitated by the careless vetting of figures nominated in the Aug. 30 Cabinet reshuffle. As chair of the Blue House personnel committee, Kang has faced criticism for failing to look into justice minister nominee Rep. Kim Seung-won’s alleged lobbying for new COVID-19 drugs, as well as accusations about sexual harassment, drunk driving and verbal abuse.

Kang also failed to anticipate the controversy over whether the gender equality minister nominee, Rep. Yong Hye-in, who is a proportional representative in the National Assembly, should be allowed to serve both posts at once.

With his approval sinking below 40%, Lee said in his Friday press conference that “after much thought and reflection, I’ve concluded that ‘the people are always right’” while referring to his own shortcomings a full 13 times.

That put Kang, as the most senior aide at the Blue House, under pressure to fall on his sword.

Kang’s offer to resign makes another reshuffle of the Blue House’s senior staff unavoidable. If Lee accepts his resignation, two of the Blue House’s three principal positions will be left vacant since Lee already accepted the resignation of his policy chief, Kim Yong-beom, on Sept. 1. National security adviser Wi Sung-lac would be the only one still in office.

Jang Dong-hyuk, the leader of the main opposition People Power Party, argued that the chief of staff is not the only official who should take the blame.

“The people who really need to take responsibility are members of the Gyeonggi-Seongnam clique, who are said to call the shots at the Blue House,” Jang said.