South Korea to rule on President Yoon's impeachment on Friday

Soo-Hyang Choi, Bloomberg News on Apr 1, 2025

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South Korea is poised to rule on the political fate of impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol, deciding whether to permanently remove him from office for his short-lived martial law decree or reinstate him.

The Constitutional Court will rule on the validity of Yoon’s impeachment on Friday at 11 a.m., the court said. The ruling will bring to a close an impeachment process initiated after the opposition-controlled National Assembly voted in December to suspend Yoon from his duties.

Yoon will immediately lose power if the impeachment is upheld, and an election to replace him will be held within 60 days. The court needs at least six of its eight justices to vote in the affirmative to oust Yoon.

If the motion is rejected, Yoon will recover his presidential powers, but the pending results of a separate criminal trial over his martial law decree will still loom large over the remainder of his days in office.

It was not immediately clear if Yoon would appear at the sentencing hearing. Yoon’s legal representative did not immediately respond to a Bloomberg request seeking comment. The ruling will be broadcast live, the court said. The ruling People Power Party said they would accept the court’s decision.

The Constitutional Court’s ruling will mark the end of a chapter in one of the most turbulent political episodes in South Korea’s recent history. The decision will help bring to an end a leadership vacuum that has put the nation in a weak position to respond to Donald Trump’s protectionist policies.

South Korea’s equity benchmark Kospi extended its gains to nearly 2% after the court’s announcement. The won, which has suffered due to the uncertainty surrounding Yoon’s political fate, rallied on the news, touching a session high of 1467.65 per dollar.

“The confirmation of the date for Yoon’s verdict is clearly helpful to South Korea’s stock market that has been weighed down by investors’ nervous wait for the ruling as well as Trump’s tariffs,” said Homin Lee, a senior macro strategist at Lombard Odier Singapore Ltd. “It will provide clarity on the country’s governance afterwards and boost hopes for a more effective negotiation with the Trump team.”

In December Yoon declared martial law, the first such order in over 40 years, shocking the nation and South Korea’s partners around the world. The decree was retracted hours later after lawmakers voted it down. The president was suspended from duties days later after parliament impeached him.

In a sign of things to come on Friday, dozens of protesters gathered near the Constitutional Court in downtown Seoul on Tuesday afternoon carrying banners saying “Oust Yoon Suk Yeol,” surrounded by police barricades. Just meters away, Yoon supporters in similar numbers were chanting for the president’s reinstatement, waving U.S. and South Korean flags.

The area is popular with tourists, and authorities were setting up a wall of police buses to prevent protesters from reaching the court. Hundreds of thousands of protesters are expected to gather in central Seoul on Friday, YTN said.

Yoon has denied any wrongdoing and said the martial law decree was aimed at preventing the main opposition Democratic Party from paralyzing his administration. He has remained defiant throughout the six-week impeachment trial and vowed to dedicate the remainder of his term to political reform if returned to power.

Polls show the DP’s leader, Lee Jae-myung, as the front-runner if a snap election is held in the event of Yoon’s departure.

An appeals court acquitted the opposition leader of making false claims in 2021 while campaigning for the presidency last week, boosting his chances of running in any future presidential elections.

If Yoon survives the ruling, he will likely return to the presidency as a lame duck leader. A weekly Gallup opinion poll last Friday showed 60% of respondents supported Yoon’s impeachment with 34% against it.

This isn’t the first time South Korea has gone through a presidential impeachment. In 2004 former President Roh Moo-hyun’s impeachment was overturned after he was accused of violating the Public Official Election Act. Eight years ago former President Park Geun-hye was removed from office over a corruption scandal.

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo is currently acting president after his powers were reinstated by the constitutional court, which ruled against his impeachment motion. After Han was temporarily impeached, Finance Minister Choi Sang-mok had been effectively leading the country.

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With assistance from Youkyung Lee, Yasufumi Saito, Shadab Nazmi, Whanwoong Choi and Catherine Bosley.