Eunpyeong B (Korean: 은평구 을) is a constituency of the National Assembly of South Korea. The constituency consists of parts of Eunpyeong District, Seoul. As of 2024, 195,270 eligible voters were registered in the constituency. The constituency was created in 1988 from the Seodaemun–Eunpyeong constituency.
Throughout its history, Eunpyeong B has elected members of liberal, centrist, and conservative political parties to represent the constituency. Despite conservative politician Lee Jae-oh being elected a total of five times in Eunpyeong B, in recent years, the liberal Democratic Party has been dominant in the constituency.[1]
Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly Kim Jae-kwang of the centre-right Reunification Democratic Party was the first member to represent the constituency.[2] He was succeeded by Lee Won-hyung of the centre-left Democratic Party who won in the 1992 election.[3]Lee Jae-oh made his debut in this election as the left-wing Popular Party candidate.[4] Lee Jae-oh won the following election held in 1996 as a member of the centre-right New Korea Party, defeating incumbent Lee Won-hyung by over eight points.[5][6] Lee comfortably won re-election in 2000 with 51% of the vote and narrowly won re-election in 2004 with 45.25% of the vote against Uri Party candidate Song Mi-hwa who received 43.07% of the vote.[7] However, Lee was defeated by Moon Kook-hyun of the centrist reformist Creative Korea Party by a margin of over eleven points.[8][9]
On October 22, 2009, Moon Kook-hyun lost his seat after he was found guilty of violating South Korean election law; specifically the political funds act.[10][11][12] Accordingly, a by-election for the constituency was held in 2010 which saw the constituency's former member Lee Jae-oh of the conservative Grand National Party win in a landslide, securing 58.33% of the vote.[13][14][15] In the 2012 election, Lee narrowly won re-election by a margin 1.14% against unified opposition candidate Cheon Ho-sun of the centre-left Unified Progressive Party.[16]
Ahead of the 2016 South Korean election, incumbent Lee Jae-oh was not re-nominated as the Saenuri Party's candidate for Eunpyeong B. This move came as the Saenuri Party's pro-Park Geun-hye faction grew influential within the party and denied renomination for many party members considered to be anti-Park or pro-Lee Myung-bak.[17][18] In response to this, Lee left the Saenuri Party on March 23, 2016, and announced his intention to run as an independent candidate on the following day.[19][20][21] The Saenuri Party decided not to nominate a candidate in the Eunpyeong B constituency on March 28, 2016.[22][23] Despite this, Lee Jae-oh failed to win re-election, being defeated by Kang Byung-won of the liberal Democratic Party who won with 36.74% of the vote.[24] Kang won re-election in 2020, garnering 57.41% of the vote.[25] Kang was not re-nominated as the Democratic Party's candidate ahead of the 2024 election after being defeated by Kim Woo-young in a party primary.[26][27] Kim won the general election with 56.95% of the vote, defeating People Power Party challenger Chang Seong-ho by a wide margin.[28]
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