2024 ROC Prez and Legislative elections Jan 13th

[jaichind]

CNEWS poll.  This poll is not high quality and is very erratic with random Blue and Green leans.  Chang from last week

DPP Lai         28.4 (-1.3)
TPP Ko          23.4 (--)
KMT Hou       15.6 (+0.8  )
pro-KMT Guo 13.0 (+0.4)

This poll seems to have a Ko lean when compared to the other polls.  

There is a number that is a disaster for the DPP:  Do you want to see the DPP defeated in the election? Yes/No 65.1/23.2

So even some of the DPP Lai vote are lukewarm about saying no to defeating DPP in the election.  There seems to be a massive anti-DPP majority which still means DPP Lai wins due to the 3-way split of the anti-DPP vote but these numbers are a disaster for the DPP down ballot where the anti-DPP vote will most likely consolidate around the KMT candidate.

[jaichind]

Guo announces half-American actress 賴佩霞(Lai Pei-Hsia) as his running mate.  She is really just a stand-in as clearly Guo's hope is some sort of deal between him and KMT Hou and/or TPP Ko where one of those two becomes his running mate in a grand anti-DPP alliance.

[jaichind]

Latest Newtalk poll (change from late Aug)

Overall good news for KMT.  Poll still seems to have a Ko-Guo lean this lean seems to have mostly corrected itself over the last couple of months.   Both TPP Hou and KMT Guo gain in the sense that Guo loses ground which makes it easier to get him to drop out later which is a pre-condition to make DPP Lai's defeat even possible.

4-way

DPP Lai and pro-KMT Guo lose ground to TPP Ko and KMT Hou.   Pro-KMT Guo lost a lot of support in the days after announcing

DPP Lai             32.04 (-1.29)
TPP Ko              24.39 (+3.42)
KMT Hou           21.09 (+2.95)
pro-KMT Guo     12.33 (-7.69)





3-way

DPP Lai loses ground to both TPP Ko and KMT Hou

DPP Lai            32.58 (-3.55)
TPP Ko             29.22 (+2.41)
KMT Hou          23.64 (+2.31)





Party support

KMT takes the lead over DPP at the expense of TPP

KMT        30.40 (+3.29)
DPP         30.06 (-0.72)
TPP         16.92 (-2.66)
NPP           1.72 (+0.39)
TSP            1.20 (-0.09)
PFP            0.70 (+0.34)

[jaichind]

The candidate list is mostly out for most legislative races.  Looking at them district by district things are looking pretty good for the KMT.  The TPP list is not large does not really have any heavyweights and for seats which are marginal the TPP candidate are mostly nobodies.  Overall this sets up the KMT and TPP PR votes to consolidate behind the KMT candidate and will spell big trouble for the DPP.

My current guess.


PR (34)                         KMT       DPP      TPP      NPP      TSP
                                     14          13         7         0         0

TPP surge cuts into NPP vote while pro-independence  PR vote shifts to DPP undermining TSP.  A lot more vote wastage on the Pan-Green side than the Pan-Blue slide.  


District(73)                   KMT+     DPP

Special municipalities
Taipei City (臺北市)           6            2 <- DPP only retains Taipei 1st and 2nd
New Taipei City (新北市)    6            6 <- DPP candidate quality holds KMT gains
Taoyuan City (桃園市)       6            0 <- A couple will be very close
Taichung City(臺中市)        5            3 <- most of them will be very close
Tainan City (臺南市)          0            6
Kaohsiung City (高雄市)     1            7 <- KMT will narrowly flip back Kaohsiung 3rd

Taiwan Province
Keelung City (基隆市)        1            0
Hsinchu City(新竹市)         1            0 <- will be a fun 4-way battle again
Hsinchu County (新竹縣)   2             0
Maioli County (苗栗縣)       2            0
Changhua County(彰化縣)  2            2  <- DPP outperforms based on rare candidate quality gap
Nanto County(南投縣)        2            0  <- DPP split will filp back Nanto 2nd
Yunlin County(雲林縣)        0            2
Jiayi City(嘉義市)               0            1
Jaiyi County(嘉義縣)          0            2
Pingdong County(屏東縣)   0            2 <- KMT could spring a surprise due to DPP split
Yilan County(宜蘭縣)          0            1 <- KMT could spring a surprise due to DPP split
Penghu County(澎湖縣)       1           0  <- lot of local factors at play but for now KMT flip
Hualian County(花蓮縣)      1            0
Taidong County(臺東縣)      1            0 <- local factors might allow DPP to hold this seat

Fujian Province
Kinmen County(金門縣)      1            0
Lianjiang County(連江縣)   1             0
 
Total District                   39           34

                                    KMT+        DPP
Aborigine seats(6)    
Plains                             2              1  <- DPP retains their seat
Mountains                       2              1  <- DPP retains their seat
 
Total Aborigine                4               2

                                 KMT+        DPP       TPP       NPP       TSP
Total                             57           49          7          0          0

Tiny KMT+ majority.   In theory DPP Lai's victory in the Prez election should help the DPP do better than this.  But DPP Lai's victory in a 4 way race would mean get will be around 36%-39% range and KMT candidate quality gap means that the anti-DPP vote would consolidate around the KMT candidate in marghinal seats to defeat DPP.  

[jaichind]

My prediction out of the 73 districts by district type

KMT pretty much will gain 6 seats for free in the Blue +4 or greater on the basis that this will not be a DPP wave election.  The marginal seats will really be how the TPP PR vote will split

                                                        2020                   2024 Prediction
                                 Total         KMT+     DPP+             KMT+       DPP+
Blue +4 or greater       23              17          6                  23            0
Blue +3 to Green +3    25               6         19                  16            9        
Green +4 or greater     25               0         25                   0           25
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total                           73             23         50                 39           34

[jaichind]

One thing I noticed about TPP Ko's campaign is that when he attacks DPP Lai (which is his main focus now since he wants to consolidate the anti-DPP vote behind him) he mostly focuses on problems/scandals of the DPP New Tide faction which Lai is associated with. 

The basic idea is that the main fault line within the DPP at the grassroots level is New Tide vs non-New Tide.  TPP Ko is looking to try to capture some non-New Tide DPP and/or light Green votes.  So the way to do this is to focus his attack on the DPP New Tide faction versus DPP overall.  Most likely this will not work.  DPP might have New Tide vs non-New Tide internal issues but for elections at the national level the DPP is very effective in unifying to fight the election as one machine.  The same is not true for local elections.

[jaichind]

Guo announces half-American actress 賴佩霞(Lai Pei-Hsia) as his running mate.  She is really just a stand-in as clearly Guo's hope is some sort of deal between him and KMT Hou and/or TPP Ko where one of those two becomes his running mate in a grand anti-DPP alliance.

With Guo picking a half-American woman as his running mate that makes it likely the second half-American woman as VP candidate in this election as DPP Lai is likely to pick the Current ROC representative to the USA Former DPP MP of Hualian 蕭美琴(Hsiao Bi-khim).



Hsiao is really aligned with DPP Prez Tsai and is very close to the USA.   Her being on the ticket is sort of a way for both DPP Prez Tsai and the USA to have someone on the inside to "watch over" a likely DPP Lai administration.    DPP Lai knows this and in a DPP Lai administration will find ways to sideline Hsiao and pigeonhole her on dealing with with USA and nothing else.  This is sort of how DPP Prez Tsai treated DPP VP Lai.  She was forced to take him on as VP in 2020 as a way to unify the DPP ahead of the 2020 elections.

Speaking of women VP.  Former DPP VP 呂秀蓮(Annette Lu) has always been negative and hostile to Hsiao when Hsiao was a rising star in the DPP in the early 2000s and Lu became VP.  Also, Lu has also been hostile to DPP Tsai from the beginning and since 2018 left the DPP and has been shifting toward a light Blue position. Lu was a long-time feminist and Taiwan Independence activist since the 1970s.  I think at the subliminal level she views herself as the one and only true women leader.  People like Hsiao and Tsai represent a threat to that self-perception and as a result lead to hostility and conflict with both.  Lu being out of DPP has also led to a shift in her position on the PRC issue.  These days she is for some sort of Confederal or Commonwealth status with the PRC which is quite a dramatic shift from her firebrand Taiwan Independence position of the 1970s to the 1990s.  Now when you watch Lu on political discussion shows with the way she attacks Tsai and DPP you would think she is a member of the KMT.

[jaichind]

https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4996482

"Taiwan recalls eggs from Brazil"

Latest DPP corruption storm.

The story is this
a) Due to various issues with production the ROC is facing an egg shortage with egg prices shooting up which means the DPP administration needs to deal with this
b) The easy way out is to lower the import tariff on eggs which will lead to an import surge and lower egg prices on ROC,
c) The DPP feared doing b) would mean a surge of PRC egg imports and that the CCP would get "credit" in helping reduce egg prices on ROC
d) So the DPP administration picked a few egg importers to do special deals with other non-PRC egg surplus economies. 
e) It turns out a bunch of these egg importers are connected to key DPP leaders and got very favorable deals from the government to import eggs.
f) In particular there was one deal that involved egg imports from Brazil where the contracts were written in a way that pretty much meant the DPP egg importer could just sit back and do nothing and just collect a fat check from the government.
g) Then it turned out a lot of these Brazilian eggs had incorrect expiration dates which added to the fuel of the scandal.

This already likely hit DPP Lai's numbers 

[jaichind]

The latest DPP renegade Formosa Times poll has DPP Lai falling.   Formosa Times has a heavy Green lean and can be erratic.  They tend to be accurate in a DPP wave election but only in a DPP wave election.

3-way
DPP Lai          35.2
TPP Ko           21.3
KMT Hou        21.2

4-way       
DPP Lai          34.3
KMT Hou        19.6
TPP Ko           18.9
Pro-KMT Guo  10.2

If you at this poll, take into account its Green lean and look at other polls  I think the state of the 4-way race is

DPP Lai           Low 30s
KMT Hou         Low to mid-20s
TPP Ko            Low to mid-20s
Pro-KMT Guo   Low teens

[jaichind]

The local NYC KMT organization arranged for a meeting between KMT Hou and NYC Mayor Adams.  During DPP Prez Tsai's visit in April NYC Mayor Adam stayed away even though historically the mayor of NYC had the job to meet ROC Prez or other key people on behalf of the USA government given the sensitives of the PRC.  Adam seems less averse to meeting KMT Hou mostly because of the power of the local KMT organization in Chinatown plus both Adams and Hou have a police background. 

[jaichind]

Guo announces half-American actress 賴佩霞(Lai Pei-Hsia) as his running mate.  She is really just a stand-in as clearly Guo's hope is some sort of deal between him and KMT Hou and/or TPP Ko where one of those two becomes his running mate in a grand anti-DPP alliance.

A problem for Guo.  It turns out that 賴佩霞(Lai Pei-Hsia) has dual ROC-USA citizenship which is not allowed for a ROC Prez or VP candidate.  She must have proof of removing her USA citizenship by the end of Nov when the ballots are printed (assuming Guo passes the threshold of signatures for him to be on the ballot.)  But the USA process for someone renouncing citizenship is 3-6 months mostly because of the backlog of tax audits.  I suspect Guo can pull enough strings, with money if necessary, to get this done but it will be tight.

[jaichind]

My current back-of-the-envelope guess on PR vote prediction

List of parties from Deep Blue to Deep Green
       
               2020 PR    2024 PR  2024 seats
UP              0.23%        0.2%                    Far Right Radical Unification
LP              0.14%         0.1%                    Far Left Radical Unification
UAA            0.12%        0.1%                    Social Conservative Unification
NP              1.04%        0.7%                    Right Unification
CP/TLP                         0.1%                    Left Unification
SFP            0.67%                                    Social Conservative Unification - de facto merge into KMT
KMT         33.36%       35.8%      14   
CPA           0.28%                                     Light Blue - de facto merged into KMT
PFP            3.66%         2.3%                    Light Blue
IU              0.22%         0.1%                    DPP Social Conservative splinter - count as Light Blue
TPP          11.22%       19.1%       7
TRP            0.08%         0.1%                   Light Green - anti-DPP
NPP            7.75%        2.5%                    Light Green - anti-DPP
GP              2.41%        1.7%                   Green Party - Light Green
DPP          33.98%       32.8%     13         
TSU            0.36%        0.2%                   KMT pro-independence splinter - count  as Deep Green
TAPA           1.01%                                  anti-Tsai Right independence - de facto merge back into DPP
FA               0.21%       0.1%                    anti-Tsai Right independence
TSP             3.16%       4.0%                    Radical independence
SSFPP          0.08%       0.1%                   Radical independence

By bloc         2020        2024
Deep Blue     1.54%      1.2%
KMT            33.36%    35.8%
Light Blue      4.17%     2.4%
TPP             11.22%    19.1%
Light Green 10.25%      4.3%
DPP             33.98%    32.8%
Deep Green    4.82%     4.2%

In 2020 DPP Tsai swept the DPP and Deep Green vote and won a large majority of the TPP vote as well as eating into the Light Blue vote.   Now in 2024 DPP Lai will be mostly restricted to the DPP and Deep Green vtoe while TPP Ko will win the TPP plus a solid part of the Light Green vote.

[jaichind]

TPP suspends party membership TPP mayor of 新竹市(Hsinchu City) 高虹安 (Ann Kao) pending accusations and future trial of corruption both as MP and as mayor.  TPP internals must be showing the storm around Kao must be hurting TPP Ko's numbers.  I suspect they most likely also show this hurting Guo's numbers as well since Kao is mostly associated with Guo her entire life and was "on loan" to TPP from Guo to become MP and then run for mayor.

[jaichind]

https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2023/09/17/2003806362

"Over 54 million imported eggs set to be disposed of"

The ROC egg fiasco continues to roll on.  DPP minister of Agriculture already offered to resign.  It seems DPP Tsai is saying no since he is associated with the Tsai faction and she does not want to appear weak in front of the non-Tsai factions which are putting pressure on him to resign.

[jaichind]

Ideal/hoped-for but still realistic scenario for each of the 3 pan-Blue candidates between now and Nov:

KMT Hou: KMT Hou opens up a 5% lead over TPP Ko across all the polls with pro-KMT Guo lagging far behind.  Guo eventually drops out enforcing KMT Hou who surges to within 5% of DPP Lai.  Then the election becomes about trying to squeeze TPP Ko for anti-DPP tactical votes.

TPP Ko: TPP Ko opens up a 5% lead over KMT Ko across all the polls with pro-KMT Guo lagging far behind.  Guo eventually drops out enforcing TPP Ko who surges to within 5% of DPP Lai.  Then the election becomes about trying to squeeze KMT Hou for anti-DPP tactical votes.

Pro-KMT Guo: KMT Hou and TPP Ko are neck to neck in the poll with pro-KMT Guo not far behind.  There gets to a point where KMT Hou and TPP Ko have a showdown talk on how to consolidate an anti-DPP front.  The compromise is for both KMT Hou and TPP Ko to drop out and back pro-KMT Gou as the compromise anti-DPP united front candidate.  The argument for Guo is Deep blue which makes him acceptable to the KMT base and Guo has had a good personal relationship with Ko and TPP since 2020.

[jaichind]

Current TPEX political trading odds

Chances of being the winner
TPP Lai   70.0%
TPP Ko    15.5%
KMT Hou 14.5%

Expected Vote share (I assume this is assuming pro-KMT Guo eventually drops out)
TPP Lai    41.5%
TPP Ko     31.0%
KMT Hou  28.5%

[jaichind]

DPP renegade TPOF pollster which has a fairly Green lean now has DPP Prez Tsai's approval/disapproval back down to where it was after the DPP defeat in the 2022 local elections although not as bad as it was in the 2018 to early 2019 period
 

[jaichind]

Latest Ettoday poll

3-way (change from early Sept) - TPP Ko gains ground

DPP Lai            34.2 (-2.3)
KMT Hou          26.0 (-3.5)
TPP Ko             24.1 (+1.2)


4-way (Lai loses ground) - DPP Lai loses ground

DPP Lai           32.0 (-3.1)
KMT Hou         24.5 (-0.3)
TPP Ko            20.7 (+0.7)
Pro-KMT Guo   13.2 (+0.3)




The egg fiasco clearly hurt DPP Lai but also took media attention from KMT Hou's successful trip to USA.  As a result TPP Ko is a net winner over the last couple of weeks.

[jaichind]

DPP renegade TPOF poll.   This pollster is youth and light green heavy which would most likely overpoll TPP KO which did take place

3-way - DPP Lai loses ground, KMT Hou gains ground




4-way (everyone loses ground to TPP Ko)

DPP Lai                 31.4 (-2.5)
TPP Ko                  23.1 (+2.6)
KMT Hou               15.7 (-2.3)
Pro-KMT Guo         10.5 (-4.7)

[jaichind]

UDN poll.  They have a light blue lean but have been erratic in both directions before

3-way
DPP Lai           30
TPP Ko            21
KMT Hou         20

Same pattern as others.  TPP Ko is strong with youth and KMT Hou strong with the elderly.   DPP Lai has consolidated the DPP vote while KMT Hou and even to some extent TPP Ko have not consolidated their KMT and TPP base yet.




On pan-Blue consolidation scenarios

4-way
DPP Lai          28
TPP Ko           20
KMT Hou        18
pro-KMT Guo  10

4-way results show that the undecided in the 3-way poll lean Blue

KMT-TPP alliance
KMT-TPP         36
DPP Lai           28
pro-KMT Guo   12

KMT-TPP-Guo grand alliance
Grand alliance  47
DPP Lai            32

Who should lead a KMT-TPP-Guo grand alliance ticket
KMT Hou         38
TPP Ko            27
Pro-KMT Guo   21




Legislative race has KMT ahead

             District          PR
KMT         26              30
DPP         22              25
TPP           5              10

[jaichind]

TVBS poll.  DPP Lai and KMT Hou gains ground at the expense of TPP Ko and pro-KMT Guo

4-way

DPP Lai         34 (+4)
TPP Ko          22 (-1)
KMT Hou       21 (+2)
Pro-KMT Guo   9 (-4)

3-way
DPP Lai         36
TPP Ko          28
KMT Hou       26

2-way
KMT-TPP       50  (KMT-TPP alliance headed by either KMT Hou or TPP Ko)
DPP Lai         40

It seems having Guo in the race increases the number of pan-Blue undecided.  This sort of means that the 4-way race undecided leans toward Blue




Approval/disapproval - other than Guo the 3 main candidates are around the same

DPP Lai          40/39
TPP Ko           41/38
KMT Hou        36/38
pro-KMT Guo  30/46


DPP Lai's gain is mostly about the large consolidation of remaining DPP and lean-DPP voters, mostly women DPP and lean-DPP voters.  Guo lost ground with KMT and pan-blue voters who went to become undecided.   Just like their July poll, this poll seems to have a heavier Green sample which mostly mitigates the TVBS pan-Blue lean and put TVBS in line with other polls like Ettoday.

[jaichind]

It looks like that Hou-Ko aliance comes to be true. Lai is not
likely to become the president.

Most likely but I think it will have to be Hou-Ko and not Ko-Hou.  A good part of the KMT vote is the organizational vote that will not come out unless the KMT is at the top of the ticket.  The Ko vote is the personal vote and the core Ko vote will vote Hou-Ko if you are convinced that Ko is going to come in third place.  So the only path toward Hou-Ko is for Guo to drop out and endorse Hou which leads to a Hou surge in the polls pushing Ko into third place by a margin.  And even then Ko has to consider the impact of a Hou-Ko ticket on the TPP PR vote which would be a priority for him.  All things equal I find this scenario very unlikely and DPP Lai is in a very strong position to win.  The main question would most likely be will DPP Lai be below or above 40%.

[jaichind]

TPP Ko makes an offer to KMT Hou for a way to get to an anti-DPP grand alliance.  He proposed a bunch of 3rd party pollsters do a poll on a specified date range and the weaker candidate drops out of the race.  Right now polls have them about 50/50 with half of the polls having KMT Hou ahead of TPP Ko and the other half the other way around.  TPP Ko is betting that the pollster's oversample cell phone users/youth which would put him ahead.   No response yet from KMT other than that the timing is not right yet (read: KMT Hou's lead over TPP Ko is not significant) and we should talk later.

[jaichind]

There are rumors that if TPP Ko senses that the KMT wants to drag out talks on a united front on the premise that KMT Hou numbers are likely to grow in October relative to TPP Ko his trump cards are

a) Form an alliance with pro-KMT Guo - this seems unlikely.  Guo will ask for a large pound of flesh which might be just as expensive as what the KMT would demand
b) Get 2020 KMT Prez candidate Han to join his front - this is in theory possible as Han is actually personally chosen to Ko and actually worked with Ko in the 2016-2018 period when Ko was Taipei mayor

Both seem far-fetched but if either one can be pulled off will be a grave threat to the KMT.

[jaichind]

It looks like that Hou-Ko aliance comes to be true. Lai is not
likely to become the president.

Lai is still leading three-way polling anyway.

Correct, and his leads are very significant (> 6%-7% even in pro-Blue polls).   Of course, these 3-way polls are in the context that pro-KMT Guo could appear on the ballot and have not endorsed either KMT Hou or TPP Ko.  If that were to change I would expect the Lai lead in a 3-way race to narrow.  Still even in that circumstance unless either KMT Hou or TPP Ko implodes it is still very likely that DPP Lai will win.