He was one of rising stars of the Democrats but fell down when he competed as the Mayor of Seoul in the 2002 local elections but lost to Lee Myung-bak who later became the President of the Republic.
[8] In 1982, his brother Kim Min-woong went to the United States to study political science at the University of Delaware but soon changed his mind to be a pastor.
[5] However, he led a reunification movement at there and therefore was unable to return to South Korea till 2002[9] due to the breach of the National Security Act.
[3] Following his detention, his mother Kim Choon-ok established the Council for the Movement of Families for the Fulfillment of Democracy, a pro-democracy organisation.
[8] He returned to South Korea prior to the 1995 local elections where he helped his party's nominee for the Mayor of Seoul Cho Soon.
[14] In the 1996 election, Kim was nominated the candidate of the National Congress for New Politics (NCNP) for Yeongdeungpo 2nd and faced off with Choi Young-han, an actor, broadcaster and the nominee of the ruling New Korea Party (NKP).
[15] He successfully defeated the famous actor; being just 32 years old,[8] he was the youngest MP as well as the opposition candidate received the highest votes in Seoul.
[7] He gained public attention during the hearing of Hanbo Group in 1997, held due to its CEO Jeong Tae-soo who was implicated in various corruption cases.
[7] On 29 October, he was selected as one of the "20 Asian Youth Leader of the Millennium" by Asiaweek, a Hong Kong-based English news magazine, along with Choo Mi-ae.
[18] Kim was re-elected in the 2000 election, but his MDP and the coalition partner, the Alliance of Liberal Democrats (ALDE), fell short of a majority.
For the 2002 local election, the MDP was planning to nominate the then Mayor Goh Kun as its candidate, but he declared to not seek for re-election.
[7] He promised eco-friendly manifestos i.e. adopting natural gas bus, stricter air pollution control and so on.
[27][28][29] When the campaign was officially begun, some supporters worried if Kim lost to Lee due to the low turnout.
[30] On 13 June, amid the 2002 FIFA World Cup and the corruption scandal of the President's sons, Kim only received 43.02% and came behind to Lee (52.28%).
[38] Because of his action, he was given a nickname "migratory bird" (철새),[1] a term refers to politicians who like to change their minds or party memberships for their own benefit.
In the 2004 election, Kim ran for Yeongdeungpo 1st to return as an MP, but amid the impeachment of the President Roh Moo-hyun, the MDP's support was plummeted.
[53] During the election campaign, Kim contested under the slogan, "Make Yeongdeungpo as Ildeungpo" (영등포를 일등포로 만들겠습니다);[2][54] the word ildeung means the "1st place" in Korean.