Special counsel Lee Tae-han’s team searched the National Election Commission’s headquarters and an unnamed supplier’s offices and factory over suspected preferential treatment in a 32.1 billion-won contract for early voting ballot issuing machines. Thirty-two personnel, including two prosecutors, took part in the operation. Investigators allege the NEC provided advance bid information to the company and later revised internal guidelines requiring local election commissions to buy ink and other supplies from it. The company supplied about 17,000 machines under the five-year project, the NEC’s largest commissioned order in that period, and provided 13.8 billion won of ink and other supplies between December 2023 and July 2026. The broader inquiry, launched in early September after ballot shortages during June’s nationwide local elections, also covers alleged monthly allowance payments to NEC commissioners, substandard equipment, possible dummy-company activity and suspected collusion involving a former NEC official’s company.