– Angry with military drills –
Security staff and police officers were later seen tackling Kim, who was dressed in traditional Korean clothes and shouting slogans against joint US-South Korea military exercises.
The annual military drills kicked off earlier this week, triggering a surge in tensions with North Korea.
Nearly 30,000 US troops are permanently stationed in South Korea and the United States would assume operational command in the event of an armed conflict with the North.
Kim heads an organisation that regularly organises protests against Japanese territorial claims to a group of small islands controlled by South Korea.
He also has a blog on which he wrote Tuesday of his opposition to the joint US-South Korea drills, saying they were blocking the resumption of a dialogue between North and South Korea.
Lippert has proved a popular ambassador, tweeting regularly about his life in the capital and setting up a tongue-in-cheek Twitter account for his dog, Grigsby.
His wife recently gave birth in Seoul and the couple gave their son a Korean middle name.
The attack carried echoes of a 2006 assault on President Park Geun-Hye when she was a legislator.
A 50-year-old man slashed Park across the face with a blade while she was out campaigning for a local election.
He was convicted of attempted murder and jailed for 10 years.
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