Lawrence Peck
The extremely serious harm that the leftist Lee Jae-myung administration has from its inception done to the ROK's relations with the U.S. government through its policies and statements has been shocking. It is even causing deep concern and motivating statements criticizing the Lee administration by many members of the U.S. Congress who typically have not had much to say about U.S.-ROK relations, and who in the past have been hesitant to openly condemn leftist ROK administrations. It seems as if some in the Lee administration have intended to deliberately provoke the Trump administration and American conservatives in and out of Congress. The situation has gotten so bad that one of the embattled, small minority of pro-alliance figures in Lee’s administration is now essentially admitting this crisis in relations. However, this official's comments about the growing tensions between the U.S. and the ROK sounded less like a "peace appeal" by the Lee administration as a whole, and more like a kind of "distress signal," and almost a kind of personal "hostage video" by this pro-alliance figure outnumbered by leftist "autonomy" faction officials. These problems are arising so often, and are of such a significant nature, that even those in Washington, D.C. who are not usually involved or interested in U.S.-ROK relations have recently started to take notice of the Lee administration's blunders and are coming to understand its true nature.
If this trend continues, the Lee administration may soon have to resort to establishing its own special team of "fixers," "troubleshooters," and "damage control" experts. "Fixers" are influential people in American politics and society who specialize in solving problems for those who employ them. The exclusive role of such a team will be to clean up the almost weekly problems caused by the Lee administration's policies and statements made by Lee and top officials of the increasingly powerful "autonomy" leftist faction within his government who are innately hostile to the U.S. and intent on appeasing North Korea and China. Several top-level Korean officials have already been tasked with this difficult duty, making sudden, panic-induced visits to U.S. officials in Washington, D.C., basically serving as Korea's version of "The Cork." Thomas "The Cork" Corcoran was an American lawyer and government official during the 1930s and 1930s who was a major power player during the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. "The Cork" was known as a "fixer" for the Roosevelt administration, a highly influential figure who specialized in damage control and troubleshooting whenever the administration experienced serious problems. One particular specialty of the "The Cork" focused on suppressing public and media criticism of Roosevelt's various domestic policies.
Thomas Gardiner Corcoran
On a few occasions, Korean or American conservatives have managed to bring the Lee administration's highly problematic policies and actions to the attention of the Trump administration, and members of the administration, up to and including President Trump, as well as Republicans in Congress have publicly expressed concerns about the direction of the Lee government. However, in sharp reaction to this, the Lee administration has been compelled to launch strong and immediate counter moves for the purpose of opposing and blunting the effects of such criticisms coming from Washington and to insistently deny the accusations raised by conservative forces in the ROK and the U.S. The first such use of a "fixer" for this type of damage control occurred just before the meeting of President Trump with President Lee in August of 2025, when President Trump posted a social media message expressing concern over the Lee administration's crackdown on Korean Christian leaders who have been critical of Lee's policies. When ROK officials saw President Trump's criticism, Lee's chief of staff rushed to meet with a top White House official in a frantic effort to thwart this criticism by claiming that Korean and U.S. conservatives had misled the Trump administration as to the true situation in the ROK. This was followed, in the actual meeting between President Lee and President Trump, by Lee's effusive flattery which was clearly aimed at diffusing the tense situation by changing the subject and tone of the conversation.
Another notable example of this same type of panicked troubleshooting by Lee administration "fixers" occurred more recently. This happened immediately after the former Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives warned of the Lee administration's increasing leftist and pro-China drift, and over 50 current Republican members of Congress issued a statement also criticizing the alarmingly left-wing and China-friendly tendencies of the Lee government. A damage control specialist from Seoul, a vice minister for diplomatic strategy and intelligence, was quickly dispatched to Washington, D.C. to meet with a top U.S. State Department official. This latest envoy from Lee almost certainly tried to appeal to his American counterpart to not trust those current and former members of Congress, Korea experts, and others who have been criticizing the policies and actions of the Lee administration. This ROK official probably also attempted to convince U.S. officials to not worry about the harsh statements condemning the U.S., U.S. forces in the ROK, and Israel which have been variously made in recent weeks and months by Lee, members of his cabinet, and leading members of his ruling leftist Democratic Party of Korea.
These efforts by Korea's versions of "The Cork," whose aim it is to counter U.S. criticism of the Lee administration's policies, actions, and statements, are supplemented by pro-Lee leftist lobbying groups and individuals in the U.S., including some within the Korean American community, and some which are pro-North Korea. They serve as full-time "supplementary" forces who back up the efforts of the "fixers" which the Lee administration sometimes sends to Washington, D.C. These U.S.-based lobbyists claim they are simply exercising their Constitutional rights as American citizens to make their views known to their elected representatives and to administration officials. However, in fact, some of these groups and activists are essentially, in a de facto sense, serving as lobbyists on behalf of the Lee administration and/or the Democratic Party of Korea without being properly registered as agents of a foreign government or political party. These groups try to falsely compare themselves to and clearly attempt to model themselves after those groups and individual Americans who lobby, for example, in support of nations with pro-U.S. governments such as Israel, Japan, Taiwan, Greece, and Argentina.
However, there is an extremely important distinction between those other American lobbyists and those who, on the other hand, are lobbying in support of the Lee government and/or the Democratic Party of Korea. Consider, for example, the American supporters of Israel. Contrary to the completely false information being spread by anti-Israel groups and activists and disreputable conspiracy theorists on the extreme-left and the extreme-right, such as Communists and neo-Nazis, the pro-Israel groups in the U.S., such as Christians United for Israel (CUFI) and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), do not support any particular Israeli government or Israeli political party. Also, contrary to a widespread myth, the truth is that the majority of pro-Israel forces in the U.S. are Christians and Christian groups, not Jews or Jewish groups. In fact, there are some leftist Jewish groups which are strongly opposed to every government of Israel. The pro-Israel groups have at various times and on various issues been critical of the Israeli government and its policies. They support Israel in a general sense, not simply one political party within Israel, and they are not involved in Israel's partisan political disputes.
On the other hand, the roles of the pro-Lee and pro-Democratic Party of Korea lobbying groups in the U.S., such as the Korean American Public Action Committee (KAPAC), have been very different. KAPAC supports only left-wing Korean governments and leftist forces in the ROK. They never express any truly significant criticism against left-wing Korean administrations or against the leftist Korea Democratic Party, but they regularly and strongly condemn conservative ROK administrations, ROK conservative political parties, and conservative civic groups. The claim by KAPAC that they support the ROK in a general sense is therefore totally false and deliberately deceptive. In practice, they support only one political force in Korea, and they are now most closely connected to only one party, the Democratic Party of Korea, whose members' visits to the U.S. they often help to arrange and assist. KAPAC has directly taken a strong partisan stance in ROK domestic politics. Supporting only one political party in Korea is not the same as supporting Korea or the U.S.-Korea alliance in a broad sense. Even those Korean American conservative groups which tend to oppose left-wing ROK administrations are still mostly distinct from KAPAC, because such conservative groups in the U.S. support a variety of different conservative forces in the ROK, not just a single ROK political party.
Regarding pro-North Korean lobbying groups in the U.S., such as Women Cross DMZ/Korea Peace Now, Action One Korea, the Korean American National Coordinating Council (KANCC), Overseas Candlelight Action, and others, the situation is even more ominous, since some leading members of these groups have for years been communicating, meeting, and collaborating with North Korean intelligence agents, and some of them have openly expressed loyalty to the North Korea regime and even called for the destruction of the U.S. and urged acts of violence against their fellow Americans. An extremely troubling situation has emerged in recent years, which has continued in recent months, whereby these pro-North Korean groups and individuals have increasingly been cooperating in joint efforts with the pro-Lee administration and pro-Democratic Party of Korea groups, especially regarding lobbying visits to Congress. There are some top officials of KAPAC, for example, who have aligned themselves with pro-North Korean and U.S. communist groups, and who have openly expressed pro-North Korean and anti-American views. This type of collaboration mirrors the political alliances in which the Korea Democratic Party, especially during 2024 and 2025, joined together in a "united front" type of coalition with extreme-left minor political parties and other pro-North Korean forces in the ROK.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the serious problem posed by the ongoing efforts of the Lee administration's "fixers," troubleshooters, and damage control teams which it periodically and urgently dispatches to Washington, D.C. to defend Lee's policies and actions, is the almost complete lack of any significant efforts to fight the "fixers," thwart the troubleshooters, and defeat the damage control specialists of the Lee government. There has been no effective push back against the envoys of Lee's government who have been rushing to the U.S. for the purpose of defending Lee's policies and actions, telling U.S. officials not to believe the warnings of Korean conservatives, and generally spreading a false impression of the Lee administration in the U.S. These ROK officials have been attempting to assure top American officials that the Lee administration and the ruling Democratic Party of Korea are not in any way hostile to the U.S. or pro-China. In spite of the recent hastily arranged trip to Washington, D.C. by top Korean conservative politicians, which may have done some good, it was nevertheless only a temporary and makeshift response. There has not been any concerted, ongoing, or well-organized counter effort by Korean or American conservatives who support a strong U.S.-ROK alliance and oppose the leftist policies of the Lee administration. There have not been sufficient measures to effectively counter the missions to the U.S. by Korea's versions of "The Cork," who seek to suppress U.S. criticism of President Lee by disingenuously insisting that the Lee administration is a sincere friend of the U.S. and denying that it is pursuing a dangerous leftist path. It is therefore absolutely essential that Korean and American conservatives now push back against this high-level influence campaign by Lee's administration.
President Lee Jae-myung [Yonhap News]
By Lawrence Peck
Lawrence Peck has been researching and monitoring the activities of pro-North Korea and far-left groups and activists in the U.S. for over 25 years. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Juris Doctor degree from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles. For several years, he lived and worked in Korea for some large Korean business groups, and he is currently an advisor to the North Korea Freedom Coalition of the U.S. Lawrence may be contacted at the following address: write.to.lawrence.now@gmail.com
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