2024 ROC Prez and Legislative elections Jan 13th

[jaichind]

The case of the pro-TPP independent candidate 馬治薇(Ma Chih Wei) in Taoyuan 1st is interesting.  

馬治薇(Ma Chih Wei) is Deep Blue, has strong pro-unificationist views, and has significant business activities in the PRC.  But at the political level, she is a nobody in the politics of Taoyuan with very few local connections.   She joined TPP a while ago and was the spokesperson for TPP in Taoyuan.  She wanted to run in Taoyuan 1st but due to the district being a tossup between KMT and DPP and not wanting to hit the KMT chances of winning as well as Ma's pro-unifications views the TPP decided not to nominate her but did agree to support her when she decided to run as a pro-TPP independent.

Ma campaigning with TPP Ko in a temple in her district

 

A few days before the election she was arrested by the DPP government-controlled security agencies saying that she took money from the CCP for her political activities.  The DPP passed a law in 2019 that made it illegal for anyone to take funding from the CCP for political activities which is meant to intimate people with business interests (most likely Deep Blue although some DPP members also do business on PRC) on the PRC from being active politically.   When the law was passed some old-guard DPP founders from the 1980s were opposed saying  "This is what the KMT did to us in the 1970s and 1980s"

Anyway, I doubt the CCP routed any money to Ma since there is no point in funding a candidate who cannot win and only could be a spoiler.   More likely she did business on the PRC that involved SOEs and the DPP government-controlled security agencies construed as "funding."

TPP tried to distance itself from her as this story can be used by the DPP to claw back Light Green votes from TPP Ko.  Her arrest most likely produced a sympathy wave for her, especially with Deep Blue voters which might be what the DPP was looking to do.  The DPP incumbent is a key person in DPP Taoyuan politics so saving him from defeat is pretty important to the local DPP.  It worked in the sense that she outperformed but the DPP incumbent was still defeated by the KMT.

KMT       48.4
DPP        43.0 (ran unsuccessfully for Taoyuan mayor in 2022)
pro-TPP    8.6 (Ma)

I suspect what happened to Ma most likely shifted the Deep Blue votes over to her but also consolidated the TPP vote in favor of the KMT candidate to defeat DPP.

[jaichind]

Analysis of all pre-election polls after being normalized and compared to the final result.

The best poll is UDN which is almost on the nose but TVBS was pretty good as well.
The worst are the KMT and TPP internal polls with TPP being way off.  

[jaichind]

TPP Ko and the TPP leadership will make a call on which party to work with in the Legislature for the election of the Speaker and Deputy Speaker.  Behind the scenes, I am sure both KMT and DPP are lobbying for TPP support.

The KMT is openly critical of the likely TPP Deputy Speaker candidate 黃珊珊 (Huang Shan-Shan) on how she sabotaged the November KMT-TPP unity talks.  The KMT is doing what they feel is a position of strength.  During the campaign, both the KMT and TPP ran on post-election cooperation against the DPP even if there were words of criticism against each other.  TPP and DPP hurled a lot of insults against each other during the campaign with TPP calling DPP New Tide corrupt while DPP called TPP traitors who cannot be trusted. 

Both DPP and TPP will pay a political cost if they tie up ergo KMT's fairly hardline position when it comes to ward Huang.

[jaichind]

I didn't realize this, but TPP Ko actually won a few places.

They are mostly in the Greater Hsinchu area.  This is because
a) TPP Ko is from Hsinchu (his parents still live there)
b) Hsinchu is the hub of the tech industry ergo they are trending high education youth areas which plays into TPP Ko's strongest demographic suits.

[jaichind]

TPP Ko's strongest region is Hsinchu City.  The legislative race there is a fun 4-way race so it would be interesting to compare the PR, legislative vote, and Prez vote there.

                        PR       District       Prez
Deep Blue         0.7
KMT               31.6         35.2        30.9
Light Blue        0.4
TPP                29.4         19.8        34.3
NPP                 4.6          12.6
Light Green      2.3    
DPP               30.2          31.9       34.8
Deep Green      0.7

Ko's sister ran as a pro-TPP independent in the district seat.

For the legislative district vote, it seems the DPP candidate got the DPP and Deep Green PR vote and a bit of the Light Green PR vote.  The KMT candidate got the Deep Blue, KMT, and Light Blue PR votes and some TPP PR votes.   The NPP candidate won some Light Green votes and got some defections from the TPP PR vote as well.   The pro-TPP independent (Ko's sister) got the TPP PR vote but lost a bunch of them due to defections to KMT and NPP candidates.

It seems some of the TPP PR vote is motivated by the need to stop the DPP candidate so some of them went to the KMT candidate and others went to NPP.  In 2020 the NPP came in a close third here so the NPP is a "credible" choice.   The KMT incumbent is a "credible" choice as well while Ko's sister has not run for office before and some of the TPP PR vote had doubts if she is a "credible" choice.

For the Prez vote it seems DPP Lai won the Deep Green and DPP PR votes and split the NPP and Light Green PR vote with TPP.  TPP Ko split the NPP and Light Green PR vote with DPP Lai but also won some defections from the KMT PR vote.  Some of the KMT PR vote wanted to stop DPP Lai and some of them viewed TPP Ko as a more likely candidate to beat DPP Lai than KMT Hou which ended up being incorrect.

Because of all this the KMT won the PR and legislative vote here but came in third on the Prez vote.

[jaichind]

Prediction: TPP will choose to be neutral in the Legislature Speaker race which is de facto handing the Speaker and Deputy Speaker to the KMT. 

[jaichind]

Former DPP Chairperson 施明德 (Shih Ming-Teh) passes away at age 83.  He was an early Taiwan Independence activist and was jailed in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was critical the the growth of proto-DPP DPP especially by leading the protests in Kaoshiung in 1979.  After being jailed for the Kaoshiung riots in 1979 he was later released and led the DPP on and off in the 1990s.  



After the DPP came to power he drifted away from the DPP and Taiwan Independnece becoming a moderate on that issue.  He broke with the DPP in 2006 over the corruption charges of DPP Prez Chen and led a cross-Blue-Green protest movement against DPP Prez Chen.  Later in his life he drifted further away from Taiwan's Independence and advocated some sort of confederal status with the PRC.  In that sense, he is similar to former DPP VP Lu who was a Taiwan Independence radical in the 1970s and 1980s but after she broke with the DPP in 2018 also shifted toward advocating some sort of confederal status with the PRC as a way out of the deadlock.

Despite his break with the DPP many old-time DPP members still view him in very positive terms since he led the proto-DPP and then DPP during times when the DPP was struggling against the dominant KMT.

[jaichind]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/15/asia/nauru-cuts-diplomatic-ties-taiwan-china-intl-hnk/index.html

"Taiwan loses diplomatic ally to China days after presidential election"

Nauru switches from ROC to PRC.  PRC already bought them a while ago and pulled the trigger right after the election if, as they expected, DPP Lai won the election.  If KMT Hou won then most likely the PRC would not have pulled the trigger.

[greengod]

tsjh301

I think this blogger wanted to see transition in 2024 election.

He blamed Ko for changing his attitude to Hou's defeat.

He predicted that the next KMT presidential candidate would be Lu Shiow-yen, the mayor of Taichung.

He predicted that Ko would become Ross Perot and his vote percentage would decline so much.

[jaichind]

tsjh301

I think this blogger wanted to see transition in 2024 election.

He blamed Ko for changing his attitude to Hou's defeat.

He predicted that the next KMT presidential candidate would be Lu Shiow-yen, the mayor of Taichung.

He predicted that Ko would become Ross Perot and his vote percentage would decline so much.

I guess people who study elections think alike.  I also came up with the Perot comparison as well.

Yes. I also think Lu will most likely be the KMT candidate in 2028. 

I do not blame Ko that much for this KMT defeat.  The fact Ko ate into the KMT PR vote shows that KMT should take most of the blame for this defeat.  Had KMT Hou kept the KMT PR vote and taken some of the TPP PR vote and the election was DPP Lai 40 KMT Hou 37 TPP Ko 23 then yes, I would blame TPP Ko for splitting the anti-DPP vote. 

Tactically I do blame TPP Ko for putting out fake polls but it is KMT Hou's weakness that made those tricks work.  TPP Ko is a one-trick pony.  Now that the real results are out and it shows TPP Ko did well but still well into third place he cannot pull the same trick in 2028.

Off the top of my head, 2028 and 2032 will be

2028
Either
DPP Lai               51
KMT Lu-TPP Ko    49
OR
DPP Lai               47
KMT Lu               43
TPP Ko                10  (which would fit the Perot 1992 and 1996 model)
DPP Prez Lai shows that a PRC-ROC war did not take place despite him being the ROC Prez which will consolidate some marginal women voters toward him relative to 2024.
KMT wins legislative majority in either case

2032
KMT Chiang         55 (Current mayor of Taipei and scion of the Chiang family)
DPP Chen            45 (Chen is the current DPP mayor of Kaoshiung)
 

Four years is a long time in politics. I know jaichind has been insistent that Lai will win reelection, but Tsai (to my eyes) seemed on track to lose in 2020 until the Hong Kong protests happened. All they need is a little more KMT-TPP consolidation.

I agree that in 2028 DPP Prez Lai's chances of reelection are most likely lower than all other ROC re-election efforts given the large buildup in anti-incumbancy.  But you should never count out the incumbent, especially in ROC.  Even at the lowest point for DPP Prez Tsai in early 2019, I rated her re-elect chances at 45% and of course, it surged upward once the HK protests took place.

One can use the 1988 to 1992 Bush the Elder experience as a model and I agree that the KMT could come up with a Clinton-type person to win in 1992.  Another USA model would be from 1992 to 1996 with TPP Ko as Perot.  In 1992 Perot was most likely closer ideologically to Bush but they were not of the same political background just like KMT Hou and TPP Ko this time.  Using the 1992 to 1996 model TPP Ko will run again in 2028 with a lower vote share but the incumbent, DPP Prez Lai, would win against a generic KMT candidate (someone like Lu who would do a better job than KMT Hou at consolidating the KMT base but will not be able to attract Light Green or youth voters leaving for TPP Ko to pick up some of those votes.)

What DPP Prez Lai has against him is that in the 2020-2022 period, the ROC economy overperformed mostly based on the tech sector.  The reversion to the mean and increased competition from the PRC in the tech sector will mean the economic situation will not be that hot over the next 4 years and the 1988 to 1992 model creates a 1992 situation for DPP Prez Lai.

[jaichind]

I looked over the results by township.  The first thing I focused on is the DPP lean toward urban, suburban, and rural areas which are

DPP lean in
                2000        2004          2008        2012         2016          2020         2024
Urban        -1.0%      -2.2%       -1.8%       -2.0%       -1.3%        -0.6%       -0.6%
Suburban    0.3%       1.8%         0.7%        0.8%        0.3%         -0.4%      -0.9%
Rural           2.2%       4.3%        4.0%        4.5%         2.9%         1.7%        1.9%

DPP Prez Chen in 2000 and 2004 is a poor fit for urban areas while DPP Prez Tsai in 2008 2012 2016 is a good fit for urban areas.  DPP Prez Lai in 2024 is a poor fit for urban areas.  Despite that the 2024 urban-suburban-rural lean retained the 2020 patterns.

In the 2004-2016 period, advanced economic sectors in urban areas would benefit from PRC-ROC economic integration ergo the weaker lean for DPP in urban areas.  After 2016, PRC coastal provinces became economic peers of the ROC (and ROK).  As a result, rural areas will benefit from PRC-ROC economic integration and urban areas will get hit so the relative leans of the DPP vote shift in response.

[jaichind]

I was able to do PR -> Prez vote map via regression.  Due to special factors in Taipei (TPP Ko was mayor here) and New Taipei City (KMT Hou is current mayor) are broken out.

Everywhere except for Taipei and New Taipei           
                            KMT Hou     TPP Ko      DPP Lai
Deep Blue                100.0         0.0           0.0
KMT                          89.5        10.5          0.0
PFP                           99.5          0.5          0.0
TPP                            0.5         99.0          0.5
Light Green                 1.0         48.5        50.5
NPP                          19.5         19.5        61.0   
DPP                            0.5          0.0         99.5
Deep Green                 0.0         0.0        100.0

Taipei
                            KMT Hou     TPP Ko      DPP Lai
Deep Blue                100.0         0.0           0.0
KMT                          92.5          7.5          0.0
PFP                           79.5        20.5          0.0
TPP                            5.5         83.5        11.0
Light Green                 2.5         49.0        48.5
NPP                          11.0         31.0        58.0   
DPP                            1.5          2.0         96.5
Deep Green                0.0          0.0        100.0

New Taipei
                            KMT Hou     TPP Ko      DPP Lai
Deep Blue                100.0         0.0           0.0
KMT                          92.5          7.5          0.0
PFP                           94.0          6.0          0.0
TPP                            2.5         91.0          6.5
Light Green                 2.0        49.5         48.5
NPP                            3.5        43.5         53.0   
DPP                            1.5          1.5         97.0
Deep Green                0.0          0.0        100.0 

DPP Lai generally defeated TPP Ko for the battle of the TPP PR vote.  DPP Lai being able to split the minor Light Green vote with TPP Ko is a victory for him since many of these minor Light Green parties have anti-DPP stances.  KMT Hou lost significant ground to TPP Ko from the KMT PR vote, especially outside of Taipei and New Taipei.  TPP PR vote not as solid in Taipei and New Taipei but where there were defections somewhat more went to DPP Lai and KMT Hou.

Generally all these factors one by one created a KMT Hou under performance, TPP Ko over performance and slight DPP Lai over performance.

[jaichind]

北斗鎮(Beidou Township) results
                                              DPP Lai     TPP Ko      KMT Hou
ROC wide                                 40.05%    26.46%     33.49%
北斗鎮(Beidou Township)            38.83%    28.17%     33.00%

Pretty close to the ROC side result with TPP Ko a bit stronger and DPP Lai a bit weaker.  This is a surprise as this township is fairly rural and tends to lean toward older voters. 

Speaking of 北斗鎮(Beidou Township) in Changhua County, it was, out of the 319 townships, villages, and zones on the ROC, the one closest to the ROC-wide Blue/Green split of 2020.   I visited this township back in 2003.  Back then one of my uncles was very into Chinese medicine to improve his health and one of the top Chinese medicine experts on ROC lived in 北斗鎮(Beidou Township) and was a friend of my uncle.  I went with my uncle to visit him on a day trip from Taipei to Changhua County.

北斗鎮(Beidou Township) is an example of what I call "the real Taiwan Province" and not the glitter of the urban Greater Taipei or the tech sector of Hsinchu City.  北斗鎮(Beidou Township) has always been fairly backward and only developed some light industry in the 1980s dragged along with the rest of the ROC industrial boom of the 1960s to 1980s.  Competition from PRC since the early 2000s clearly has eroded whatever industrial base 北斗鎮(Beidou Township) developed and now it is mostly a township of small retail businesses. I doubt 北斗鎮(Beidou Township)  has changed much since the early 2000s when I visited it.  Based on what I know most youth from this area migrate North after they finish high school or college.  The economic future of 北斗鎮(Beidou Township)  is cloudy at best.  Not a surprise at all that the township heads here keep on getting arrested for corruption.

[jaichind]

I looked at the results by township the best approximation for ROC-wide results is 通霄鎮 (TongHsiao township) of Deep Blue Miaoli County.   通霄鎮 (TongHsiao township) is the second most pro-DPP township in the county.  It is on the coast which makes it more urban and commercial than the rest of the county which is dominated by pro-KMT rural Hakkas.

通霄鎮 (TongHsiao township) results
                                              DPP Lai     TPP Ko      KMT Hou
ROC wide                                 40.05%    26.46%     33.49%
通霄鎮 (TongHsiao township)      40.39%    25.70%     33.91%

[jaichind]

TPP Ko finally came out to address the issue of what he called "fake polls" vs TPP internals and the results validating "fake polls" and the TPP internals being way off.   I predicted his response which was "Our turnout model was wrong and there was no youth turnout surge.  We are very transparent and release all details of our internals.  Out polls matched mainstream polls if you do not factor in what we expected to be a youth turnout surge.  We made that assumption but we were wrong.  What we did was a technical error but not an attempt at fraud to fool our supporters."

This is exactly what I predicted before the election.  I dug into the details of TPP internals and concluded that their results are similar to mainstream polls and that TPP was assuming a youth turnout surge which I think was unrealistic.  Of course, most people just looked at the headline and not the fine print.   The very detailed released of the TPP internal details was to pave the way for the current TPP Ko defense which I predicted as well.

I think they released the raw numbers as well so if the election results have TPP Ko in third place by a good margin TPP can say "Look, our poll was not a fraud, look at the raw numbers, we merely got the turnout model wrong"  This way their get the result they want from a headline point of view but can point to the fine print when the result does not match their poll.

[jaichind]

This time around with TPP really part of the Blue bloc I think the result will most likely be

2024 FPTP             41                                      32
2024 Aborigine        4                                        2
2024 PR                          15              3                         14                 2
2024 Total            63                                       50

A year ago I said if we count TPP loosely as part of the Pan-Blue bloc then the Blue-Green legislative balance will be 63-50.  It ended up being 62-51.  Of course, all sorts of sub-details were way off but they mostly canceled each other out.

[jaichind]

Updated historical ROC Prez election Blue/Green split

I am going to count TPP as Pan-Blue even though if you look at the nature of the TPP vote I would say it's around Blue/Green 70/30 but I will have to approximate for continuity.

              Blue        Green
1996     65.41%     34.59%  (estimated as part of the KMT Lee's vote was Pan-Green)
2000     60.07%     39.93%  (DPP Chen wins as the Pan-Blue vote was split)
2004     49.89%     50.11%
2008     58.45%     41.55%
2012     54.37%     45.63%
2016     43.88%     56.12%
2020     42.87%     57.13%
2024     59.95%     40.05% (DPP Lai wins as Pan-Blue vote was split)

As a % of VAP

              Blue        Green
1996    49.20%     26.02%
2000    49.20%     32.71%
2004    39.03%     39.21%
2008    44.22%     31.43%
2012    40.14%     33.69%
2016    28.70%     36.71%
2020    31.75%     42.31%
2024    43.08%     28.78%

The Pan-Green vote as a percentage of VAP is at a record low since 1996.  Even if we allow for around 30% of the TPP vote to count as Pan-Green that would just put it at around 33.5% while the Pan-Blue vote as a percentage of VAP would be around 38.5%.  These numbers would look a lot like 2012.  So we can call the era of 2016-2020 DPP super outperformance under DPP Prez Tsai over.

[jaichind]

DPP Lai ran around a bit over 2% behind the Pan-Green PR vote.  That makes sense because TPP Ko was going to get some of the NPP votes as well as other light Green minor party PR votes when some of them ran on anti-DPP platforms.

Only in 2 townships did DPP Lai run ahead of the Pan-Green PR vote.  One is a tiny town in Deep Blue Kinmen County of Fujian Province where there are only 569 registered voters.  In that town, the Light Green PR vote seems to be zero and some of the TPP PR voters must have voted for DPP Lai.

The other township is 萬里區(Wanli District) of New Taipei City.



This is the place where DPP Lai grew up and the location of his childhood home 賴皮寮 or "Shameless Shack".

All the negative attention KMT and TPP threw at this location must have triggered a sympathy vote for DPP Lai with non-Pan-Green PR voters.  I would say that all those memes about this house must have yielded around 400 extra votes locality-based sympathy votes for DPP Lai.

DPP Lai's "illegal" house issue is turning into a meme

Various ROC map apps now have this house named 賴皮寮 or "Shameless shack"
The word for shameless "賴皮" starts with the word "賴" or DPP Lai's last name

Online everyone is referring to this "illegal" house as 賴皮寮 or "Shameless shack"

The core issue here is one of crisis management.  If when this story broke a couple of months ago DPP Lai just said "Yes, this house violates zoning laws.  We will tear down the house and pay back taxes owned on this house" that would been the end of it.  But DPP Lai insisted that the house was legal and then started an entire sympathy campaign about how this house represented his memories of his dead father who died the same year DPP Lai was born.  Of course, that logic makes no sense since this current house was built in 2003 when DPP Lai was already MP.

[jaichind]

It seems KMT Chairperson Chu will not resign but serve out his term until 2025.  I guess the logic is that KMT lost the Prez vote but became SLP in the legislature.   I think whether Chu stays or goes does not matter that much.  What is critical is that Taichung Mayor Lu runs and becomes the leader of KMT in 2025.

The 2016 2020 and 2024 KMT nomination process led to KMT candidates underperforming.  In all 3 cases the strongest KMT candidate was not the KMT Chairperson or did not initially want to run.  Worst, in all 3 cases, the strongest KMT candidate was a sitting mayor which created all sorts of conflicts of interest.

For the 2028 race in theory the KMT can break from this tradition.  Everyone seems to agree that Taichung Mayor Lu (age 63) is the strongest of the KMT candidates in 2028 and it is her turn.  She will step down from being mayor in 2026 so there is no conflict with her taking over the KMT in 2025 and running for Prez against DPP Prez Lai in 2028.

Taichung mayor 盧秀燕(Lu Shiow-Yen)


Both 盧秀燕(Lu Shiow-Yen) and her sister 盧秀芳(Lu Hsiu-Fang) were superstar news anchors back in the 1980s and early 1990s

盧秀燕(Lu Shiow-Yen) in the early 1990s


Her sister 盧秀芳(Lu Hsiu-Fang) is still in the media today and is a key anchor for pro-Deep Blue and pro-PRC CTITV.

[jaichind]

On the DPP side, it would be interesting on the role DPP Prez Tsai plays in the party.  DPP Prez Tsai is part of and the leader of the DPP but was never really of the DPP.  DPP Prez Tsai taking over the DPP in 2008 is like a powerful family fallen on very hard times and the daughter-in-law had to stop into the void to save the family.  After the family fortunes were revived the true scions of the family will be looking to take over the helm again and push the daughter-in-law back to her rightful place in the shadows.  The dynamics of the core DPP and the Tsai and her faction after DPP Lai takes over will be interesting.

[jaichind]

KMT VP candidate Chao returns to host his political talk show on TVBS.  It is pretty funny to watch political commentator Chao talk about about the Hou-Chao ticket, himself, and the candidates he just ran against including of course DPP Prez election Lai and TPP Ko.

He admitted that when he saw the size of TPP rallies the last week before the elections he knew there was not going to be a TPP collapse and that the election was most likely lost.  That was my assessment as well.

[jaichind]

The rumors are out that DPP wants to do a deal with TPP where there will be a DPP Speaker of the Legislature and TPP's 黃珊珊(Huang Shan-shan) as Deputy Speaker.  The KMT are also in talks with TPP and the plan there is a KMT Speaker of Legislature and TPP's 黃國昌(Huang Kuo-chang) as the Deputy Speaker.  Just like I predicted, KMT and DPP preferences are around "we do not want do deal with traitors of our ideology"    黃國昌(Huang Kuo-chang's brand last couple of years is anti-DPP despite his Deep Green background and 黃珊珊(Huang Shan-shan)'s brand is anti-KMT despite her Deep Blue background.

There is a significant chance that TPP Ko's vote share might fall below 20%.  If that is the case his ability to control TPP will be quite compromised. In that situation, the TPP legislative caucus will become much more powerful.  The two people like to emerge as the de facto leader of TPP in that scenario are 黃珊珊(Huang Shan-shan) or 黃國昌(Huang Kuo-chang.)

The two will likely have two very different paths in mind for TPP.  The path will be at odds with their ideology and be much more about their personal political experience.

黃珊珊(Huang Shan-shan) started as Deep Blue and was recruited by current KMT VP candidate Chao to enter into NP in the mid-1990s.  She served as a NP MP and later joined PFP and became more Light Blue in her orientation   She tried to become and failed to be a KMT-PFP joint candidate for MP in 2008 which led her to take on an anti-KMT position.  In 2016 she took support from DPP to run against the KMT in her district in Taipei in a losing effort but as a result, she built a personal relationship with DPP Prez Tsai.  Her brother has a military background and is non-political but became pretty high up in the DPP Tsai administration DoD.  In the end, she made too many enemies in the Pan-Blue ecosystem so she eventually joined TPP.   黃珊珊(Huang Shan-shan)'s orientation, despite her Deep Blue background, is mostly anti-KMT and if she is in charge of TPP she is much more likely to take a neutral position between KMT and DPP and could side with DPP under the right circumstances.   




黃國昌(Huang Kuo-chang) has a Deep Green anti-KMT background and has been an activist since the early 2000s mostly against the KMT agenda.  He was a co-founder of NPP and ran in the 2014 and 2016 elections as a DPP ally.  Under the 2016 DPP Tsai administration he collided with the DPP on resource sharing between DPP and NPP and by 2020 had become mostly anti-DPP.  Eventually, he made too many enemies in the Pan-Green ecosystem and became much more pro-Ko leading to him joining TPP earlier in 2023.  Despite his Deep Green background 黃國昌(Huang Kuo-chang) is mostly about being anti-DPP and anti-New Tide faction.  If he were in charge of TPP he would for sure take a tactical alliance with the KMT line against the DPP.


The story of the two Huangs shows that personal experience and personal conflicts play a bigger role than ideology in determining their political line.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

If DPP Lai wins re-election in 2028 who is the DPP nominee in 2032?

[jaichind]

If DPP Lai wins re-election in 2028 who is the DPP nominee in 2032?

Current DPP mayor of Kaoshiung 陳其邁(Chen Chi-Mai) or DPP VP elect 蕭美琴(Hsiao Bi-Khim)

[jaichind]

Formosa Times' final projection that came out on the day of the election right after polls closed (polling and projections are allowed during the 10-day blackout period but you cannot publish them) was

DPP Lai       40.0
KMT Hou     34.4
TPP Ko        25.6

Which was pretty much bang on with the final results.   Note that Formosa Times polling had a 10%+ DPP Lai lead the last 2-3 weeks but Formosa Times concluded that they had DPP lean so their projection adjusted for that house effect.



The Formosa Times' final public projection right before the blackout was

Formosa Times's final projection is a DPP Lai 3.5% victory
DPP Lai        41.2
KMT Hou      37.7
TPP Ko         21.1

This mostly tells a story that TPP Ko won the last 2 weeks of the election, especially during the 10-day blackout period.  I expected TPP Ko to lose ground during the last two weeks as the marginal vote consolidated around the two frontrunners and the KMT ground game will swamp TPP in the battle for KMT-TPP marginal voters.   But what took place was that TPP could use social media to convince their core TPP and marginal KMT-TPP voters that TPP Ko was in second place and that there was a shift from KMT Hou to TPP Ko in the last 10 days of the election.  The successful TPP rallies seem to help confirm this trend and helped get KMT-TPP marginal voters to shift to TPP Ko.

Interviews with DPP and KMT insiders after the election seem to confirm that they saw the same trend and internal assessments in both camps mostly matched results.  The KMT concluded toward the end that their window to win was gone and after the successful TPP rallies the day before the election the KMT high command knew the election was lost.  

Interestingly it was the TPP camp that had an overoptimistic view of the election toward the end.  The TPP camp seemed convinced that it was in clear second place and was within 1%-2% of DPP Lai the day before the election.  I guess TPP believing this also helped them convince their supporters and marginal KMT-TPP voters that they had the best shot of beating DPP Lai.

I guess the lesson of the final 2 weeks is that the domination of the overall narrative is critical and will trump retail politics when it comes to a Presidential-type election.  That is sort of the same lesson of the most recent GOP Iowa Cacusus as well.   Trump had the narrative and he did not need to campaign to run.  TPP Ko had the narrative on social media and actually benefited from the poll blackout to control the narrative.

For TPP Ko this might have been a win but it is a one-trick pony.  He now has a lot less social narrative capital left to try the same game in 2028 if he were to run again.