The three bills blocked by President Yoon Suk Yeol, including one for a special investigation into first lady Kim Keon Hee, were scrapped Friday after failing to get the National Assembly votes required to override Yoon's veto. The bills were voted on for a second time during an afternoon plenary session, but neither got the two-thirds majority support needed to force them through. The bill for a special counsel investigation into the first lady, passed by the Assembly on Sept.
19, is an updated version of another one vetoed by President Yoon Suk Yeol in January. It was scrapped after a 194-104 vote with one abstention and one invalid vote on Friday. The previous version focused on appointing a special counsel to investigate theKim's alleged involvement in a stock manipulation scheme involving Deutsch Motors, a BMW car dealer in Korea, which goes back to 2009 and 2012.
The latest version seeks to look into other allegations including illegally interfering in the April general election, and a more detailed probe into Kim's receipt of a luxury bag from a Korean American pastor in September 2022. This follows the Seoul Central District Prosecutors Office's recent decision to drop graft, bribery and other charges against her following a four-month inquiry into the case. While the ruling People Power Party announced prior to Friday's plenary meeting that its official stance was to vote down the special counsel bill, four lawmakers within the 108-member party chose to vote for the .
