Old polling data misrepresented as recent South Korean presidential election survey

Published on May 15, 2025 at 04:41
3 min read
By SHIM Kyu-Seok, AFP South Korea

With less than three weeks until South Korea’s presidential election, a graphic was shared in social media posts that falsely claimed it showed the latest polling data published on May 13. The graphic, which suggests People Power Party candidate Kim Moon-soo is leading the Democratic Party's Lee Jae-myung, in fact uses figures collected in January and February. Official polling data published by the National Election Commission shows the graphic was altered to remove the dates the surveys were conducted.

"Current figures 2025 5 13," reads part of the Korean-language caption of a graphic shared on Facebook on May 14.

The graphic, titled "opinion polling", shows the results of three surveys conducted by pollsters JoWon C&I, WinGKorea Consulting and KOPRA.

All three surveys show People Power Party candidate Kim Mun-soo leading the opposition Democratic Party candidate Lee Jae-myung.

Screenshot of the false Facebook post, captured on May 14, 2025

The graphic surfaced ahead of South Korea's snap presidential election on June 3, triggered by former leader Yoon Suk Yeol's removal from office over his short-lived martial law declaration last December.

Most pre-election polling data published by local media indicated Lee was leading Kim by wide margins of 10 points and above (archived link).

Among the survey results released on May 14, a Gallup Korea poll conducted May 12 to 13 showed Lee at 51 percent and Kim at 31 percent, while a Hangil Research survey from May 11 to 12 showed Lee at 50 percent and Kim at 38 percent (archived here and here).

The graphic showing Kim leading Lee, however, was widely shared among conservative social media users.

"This is proof that most of the polls released by the media are fake and lie to us," read a comment on one of the posts.

Another said: "The other polls were tampered with to get us to give up voting."

The circulating graphic, however, uses data from the beginning of 2025.

Old poll numbers

A keyword search found the graphic used in the false posts was altered from one published in an AsiaToday report on May 11 that said the surveys were conducted from late January to late February (archived link).

The report singled out these surveys as being "past examples" that reflected the "possibility that Lee can be beaten if the conservative camp unites".

The dates of the surveys were cropped out of the falsely shared graphic.

Screenshot comparison of the falsely shared graphic (left) and the AsiaToday graphic published on May 11 (right), with the cropped out dates highlighted by AFP

South Korean election law mandates all pre-election opinion polling that is publicly released must be registered on the website of the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission (archived link).

The graphic published by AsiaToday correctly lists the dates of the JoWon C&I poll as January 18 to 19, WinGKorea Consulting as February 12 and the KOPRA poll as February 21 to 22, which matches data on the commission's website (archived here, here and here).

AFP could not find any poll results released on May 13 that matched the numbers used in the falsely shared graphic.

AFP previously debunked a similar false claim misrepresenting old survey results as former President Yoon Suk Yeol's approval numbers following his impeachment.

Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.

E-mail