Ruling party lawmaker may miss audit of Korean missions in Americas after failing to obtain US visa

Rep. Jung Chung-rae of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea said Thursday he has requested to switch to the National Assembly's European audit team as his US visa application remains under review.

In a Facebook post, Jung said he decided to seek reassignment from the Americas team to the European team after being told that his visa application was still being reviewed by the US State Department.

"I was informed by my aide that, as of today, my US visa remains under review by the US State Department," Jung wrote. "I could no longer wait in a situation where it had neither been approved nor denied, so I urgently applied to switch to the European team."

Jung had been scheduled to leave for the United States on Sunday and attend an on-site audit of South Korean diplomatic missions in the Americas beginning Monday in Washington. The team was also scheduled to travel to Brazil and Colombia during its 12-day trip.

There have been no reports that other lawmakers scheduled to participate in the audit in Washington have faced similar visa problems.

Jung's request for reassignment came after he similarly failed to obtain a US visa ahead of a parliamentary audit in 2013, when he was eventually reassigned from the Americas team to the European team.

Jung argued that there was no apparent reason for his visa application to face difficulties, citing his previous visits to the United States as a lawmaker.

He said he traveled to the United States in 2012 to take part in a parliamentary audit by the National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee. He also visited the country in 2014 as a lawmaker, meeting five members of the US House of Representatives, including then-Asia and the Pacific Subcommittee Chairman Steve Chabot and Mike Honda, who had been active on the issue of Japan's wartime sexual slavery.

Jung said he also met former US Ambassador to South Korea Donald Gregg at Gregg's residence during the 2014 trip.

In 2013, however, Jung failed to obtain a US visa ahead of a National Assembly audit of overseas diplomatic missions.

At the time, attention turned to Jung's involvement in an anti-US student protest in 1989 as a possible factor behind the visa issue, although US authorities did not publicly disclose the reason.

In 1989, while Jung was a university student and a member of the National Council of Student Representatives, he led an occupation protest at the US ambassador's residence in Seoul. He was later sentenced to two years in prison for violating the National Security Act.

Jung is a four-term lawmaker who served as leader of the Democratic Party from August 2025 to June 2026.