Cheong Wa Dae Says No Prior Talks on Supreme Court Justice Nomination Process, Calling It an Unprecedented Constitutional Issue

[Financial News] Cheong Wa Dae said on the 21st that it had never discussed in advance the specific method of recommending candidates for Supreme Court justice appointments, pushing back against the Supreme Court's claim that it had coordinated a written nomination process during Chief Justice Cho Hee-dae's selection of candidates.
Speaking on OhmyTV's "Park Jung-ho's Hotspot" that day, Sung said the controversy over the Supreme Court justice nominations reflected "a pattern that departs from established customs and practices." He added, "We see this as a unilateral notification process that skipped consultation and failed to respect the president's authority to make appointments."
Earlier, Minister of the National Court Administration Noh Gyeong-pil told the Legislation and Judiciary Committee of the National Assembly that Cheong Wa Dae had effectively refused a meeting between the president and the chief justice and instead chose to recommend the candidate in writing after consulting with the senior presidential secretary for civil affairs.
Sung rejected that account, saying, "Neither of those claims is true at all."
He said there had been discussions on general matters related to Supreme Court justice nominations, but stressed that "there was absolutely no consultation on specific procedures, including whether the nomination would be made in writing."
He also denied claims that Cheong Wa Dae had blocked an opportunity for President Lee Jae-myung and Chief Justice Cho to meet. Sung said, "The Supreme Court side asked whether a meeting would be possible if consultations were reached, and we simply replied that we should discuss it then if consultations were made." He added that the claim that the meeting was refused was "not consistent with the facts."
Cheong Wa Dae is treating the process by which Chief Justice Cho recommended Son Bon-gi, a chief judge at the Daegu District Court, as a Supreme Court justice nominee with great seriousness. Sung said, "Since the 1987 constitutional revision, many Supreme Court justices have been nominated and appointed, but we recognize this as an unprecedented issue in constitutional history, with no prior example of this kind of process."
He said no decision has yet been made on calls from some quarters to suspend the appointment process or request a new nomination. Sung stated, "We are carefully reviewing customary and legal issues and are deliberating in order to make a judgment based on that."

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