is a Japanese politician who served as leader of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) from 2021 to 2024. He is also a member of the House of Representatives in the National Diet, currently for the Kyoto 3rd district. He was first elected in 2000 under the Democratic Party of Japan. He served as Parliamentary Vice-Minister of the Cabinet Office from 2009 to 2010. After that, he served as chairman of the National Diet Measures Committee and Political Affairs Research Chairman of the Kibō no Tō, the Democratic Party for the People, and the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan.
Izumi was born in Sapporo, Hokkaido, and was raised in Ishikari. After graduating from junior high and high school, he attended Ritsumeikan University Law School. While in university, he began to assist Kazunori Yamanoi, and, in 1996, when the Democratic Party formed, served as permanent secretary inside the Kyoto Prefecture. When he graduated from university in 1998, he became Tetsuro Fukuyama's secretary.
He ran as a candidate in the 2000 election for Kyoto-3, but lost, and did not win a seat proportionally. He ran again in 2003 election, and won. During the Democratic Party of Japan government's from 2009-2012, he served as Parliamentary Vice-Minister of the Cabinet Office and was in charge of the Administrative Reform Council. Although he lost his seat both in 2003 election and 2014 election, he won a seat proportionally both times, and won a by-election for the seat in 2016. When the Democratic Party split in 2017, he joined Kibō no Tō, where he served as the chairman of the National Assembly Committee from 2017 to 2018. In the Democratic Party for the People, which formed from a merger of Kibō no Tō and the Democratic Party, he served as the chairman of the National Assembly Committee in 2018 and the chairman of the Political Affairs Research Committee from 2018 to 2020.
In 2020, following the merger of the DPP into the CDP, he ran for leadership, but lost to Yukio Edano. He then became the party's Political Affairs Research Chairman. When Edano resigned as party leader following the results of the 2021 election, Izumi ran again in the leadership election and won, defeating Seiji Osaka and others to become party leader. Izumi formed the CDP's 'Next Cabinet' in September 2022 and became the shadow Prime Minister. Losses in the 2022 House of Councillors election and the 2023 by-elections saw Izumi lose party support, and despite victories in early 2024, he was defeated in the 2024 CDP leadership election. He was one of seven CRA representatives to win his district, Kyoto-3rd, in 2026 general election.
Early life Izumi was born on 29 July 1974, in Sapporo, Hokkaido. Izumi's family was self-employed in a ranch-related business. His father, Norio (Who died in 2011 at the age of 74), served as the neighborhood chairman, and later as a member of the Ishikari City Council. According to Kenta, his father was a conservative person, but when Kenta himself ran for the House of Representatives in 2000, his father switched to the Democratic Party of Japan.
Izumi lived in Izumi lived in Tonden, Kita-ku, Sapporo until he was about three years old, and then moved to Ishikari, where he lived until high school. His father was vocal about his own political opinions, and Izumi began to become curious about politics and elections in elementary school. After graduating from elementary school, Izumi entered Hanagawakita Junior High School. In junior high school, he belonged to the baseball club and served as the student council president. After graduating from junior high, he was planning to go to Sapporo Kita High School, but after seeing that Hokkaido Sapporo Kaisei High School participated in the Japanese High School Baseball Championship, he attended Kaisei instead. In high school, he again served on the baseball team and acted as student council president.
After graduating from high school, he entered the Ritsumeikan University School of Law. When he returned to Hokkaido during the summer vacation after his first year at university, a rally was held for the "New Wind Hokkaido Conference"; it was established by Takahiro Yokomichi, who served as Governor of Hokkaido, in preparation for his return to national politics. Izumi pointed out to Yokomichi the lack of young people at the rally. According to Izumi, about two days later, Yokomichi called his parents house, asking if he could speak with Izumi. This began his serious connection to politics. When Izumi returned to Kyoto for university, he visited the Japan Socialist Party Kyoto Prefectural Federation, but was told by executives there he had no future inside the party. Thereafter, he began assisting Kazunori Yamanoi, a lecturer at Ritsumeikan, with his political activities (Yamanoi would go on to become a representative of the Democratic Party). Yamanoi also introduced him to Tetsuro Fukuyama.
When the Democratic Party formed in 1996, Izumi served as permanent secretary of the Democratic Party in the Kyoto Prefecture. During the Kyoto mayoral election held in the same year, he organized a lecture event inviting candidates to speak. He was in the debate club at Ritsumeikan, and also served as President of the "Student Speech and Debate Exchange Group", a cross-university debate club. During the Nakhodka heavy oil spill accident, which was a result of a Russian taker crash off the coast of the Oki Islands, he chartered two buses to assist in the recovery effort and volunteered in heavy oil cleanup. He also worked as a staff member for an environmental NGO at the COP3 event held in the same year.
Early career After graduating from university in 1998, Izumi became Tetsuro Fukuyama's secretary. After a while, he had retired from his secretary job and had received a job offer from a private company. He was persuaded by Seiji Maehara and others to instead run in the 2000 Japanese general election, specifically for Kyoto's third ward. However, he was defeated by Shigehiko Okuyama and the LDP, and was unable to make a proportional comeback. After his defeat, he returned to his previous political activities while working part-time as a daycare worker and elderly caretaker.
In 2003, he ran again for the third ward and was elected for the first time, defeating Okuyama. He was re-elected in the 2005 election, defeating Koichiro Shimizu of the LDP and others. Izumi belonged to the Ryounkai, otherwise known as the Maehara group. He was an endorser of Maehara when he ran and won against Naoto Kan for DPJ leadership.
In February 2008, during his second term, he worked with Taro Kono, Masahiko Shibayama, Kenichi Mizuno, and Koichi Yamauchi of the LDP along with Sumio Mabuchi and Goshi Hosono of the DPJ to introduce new rules regarding the operation of the Diet, including a year-round Diet session. In May of the same year, he also proposed a law to give compensation to former BC-class war criminals from Taiwan and the Korean Peninsula. In Yukio Hatoyama's "NEXT Cabinet", roughly equivalent to shadow governments, Izumi was named Deputy Minister of the Cabinet Office.
In the Democratic Party administration (2009-2011)
Izumi defeated Koichiro Shimizu again in the 2009 election, in which the Democratic Party of Japan won a majority and ascended Yukio Hatoyama to become prime minister. In the Hatoyama Cabinet, Izumi was appointed Parliamentary Vice-Minister of the Cabinet Office and became head of the Administrative Reform Council which was formed by Hatoyama. He also became the leader of the Food SOS Response Project, which was launched by the Consumer Affairs Agency to address health issues such as Econa, an edible coconut oil which had concerns over its safety for human consumption.
In the first Kan Cabinet that was established in June of 2010, Izumi was reappointed as Parliamentary Vice-Minister of the Cabinet Office. After the first Kan Cabinet, he served as a director of the Budget Committee. In the 2011 Democratic Party of Japan leadership election, which was won by Yoshihiko Noda, Izumi was again one of Seiji Maehara's endorsers. Maehara finished third.
Post-2012 Democratic Party years
In the 2012 election, which ended the DPJ's brief stay in power by a landslide, Izumi lost to Kensuke Miyazaki in the third ward. This was the first defeat Izumi suffered since the 2000 election within the ward. Nevertheless, he was revived on the Kinki proportional representation block. In September 2013, he became chairman of the Democratic National Movement Committee. In February 2014, he was elected chairman of the Kyoto Prefectural Democratic Party Federation. Izumi lost to Miyazaki again in 2014, but was again revived on the Kinki proportional block, winning a fifth term.
In the 2015 Democratic Party leadership election, Izumi endorsed Goshi Hosono, who narrowly lost to Katsuya Okada.
In April 2016, in an attempt to return to his former district, Izumi ran in the 2016 Kyoto 3rd district by-election under the newly reformed Democratic Party, after Kensuke Miyazaki resigned due to allegations of an affair. Since the LDP did not run a candidate, he won by a 40 point margin, capturing a safe majority of 65.42% against his closest opponent, a member of Nippon Ishin no Kai. After his victory, Izumi became the chairman of the Kyoto Prefectural Democratic Party. In the 2017 Democratic Party leadership election, he backed Maehara and served as secretary-general for his campaign office.
Kibō no Tō and DPP (2017-2020) In the 2017 general election, in which the Democratic Party effectively split into the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan and Kibō no Tō, Izumi joined Kibō no Tō along with Seiji Maehara. He ran in his own ward as a member of the party, defeating Yayoi Kimura from the LDP and others. He considered running for co-representative of the new party, but gave up due to the difficulty of gathering nominations. After the representative election, Izumi was appointed as the head of the National Diet Committee. In May of 2018, the Democratic Party for the People was formed by Yuichiro Tamaki as a merger of the remaining members of the Democratic Party and Kibō no Tō. Izumi joined the new party, and was subsequently appointed as chairman of the National Assembly task force for the party. He also served as Chairperson for Political Affairs Research.
Joining the CDP and leadership election (2020-2021) In 2020, the DPP and SDP merged into the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan Izumi merged and joined the CDP, running in the leadership election which occurred afterwards. In the leadership election, he faced Yukio Edano, who served as party leader before the merger. Izumi advocated clarifying the vision of the CDP, establishing a more policy focused opposition party, and managing the party in an open manner. He also proposed that the party be renamed to the "Democratic Party", in a member vote that was happening at the same time as the leadership election. Izumi was ultimately defeated by a wide margin, and the party was named "Constitutional Democratic Party", as advocated for by Edano.
After the election, Izumi was appointed as the chairman of the Political Affairs Research Committee. He also established the "New Government Study Group", also known as the "Izumi Group", which was mostly made up of former members of the DP and DPP. He became its chairman.
CDP Representative (2021-2024) CDP leadership election