2024 ROC Prez and Legislative elections Jan 13th

[jaichind]

At a macro level, while there are signs that Guo is doing some endorsements for some KMT legislative candidates there are no signs Guo will endorse KMT Hou.  If anything TPP Ko's campaign is getting a bit stronger toward the end of the campaign so there will be no TPP Ko collapse and he will most likely finish above 20%.  In other words, the dynamics of the race have not changed fundamentally in the last two weeks. 

All this seems to imply that DPP Lai will get a narrow win on election night with a margin of around 1%-3%

[Octowakandi]

At a macro level, while there are signs that Guo is doing some endorsements for some KMT legislative candidates there are no signs Guo will endorse KMT Hou.  If anything TPP Ko's campaign is getting a bit stronger toward the end of the campaign so there will be no TPP Ko collapse and he will most likely finish above 20%.  In other words, the dynamics of the race have not changed fundamentally in the last two weeks. 

All this seems to imply that DPP Lai will get a narrow win on election night with a margin of around 1%-3%

How much anger at Ko and TPP will there be from KMT? Or is there still going to be a pretty interesting working relationship?

[jaichind]

How much anger at Ko and TPP will there be from KMT? Or is there still going to be a pretty interesting working relationship?

I do not think it will be that much.  In the end, even though TPP Ko is de facto Light Blue he is not "of the KMT" so he is pretty much finding a way to get Pan-Blue votes even though he has a Deep Green background.  In that sense, it is hard for the KMT base to fault him.  That would be different for someone with a KMT background and running an independent campaign.  Besides the KMT will most likely need TPP to form a safe majority in the Legislature which is especially important if KMT Hou were to lose.

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

Hopefully Lai and the rest of the good guys (DPP) win the election.

[jaichind]

Last day before the elections

Final DPP rally


Final KMT rally


Final TPP rally


Again it is TPP that outperformed in being able to get a rally at least in the same order of magnitude with DPP and KMT.

[jaichind]

It seems around 200K voters from ROC have returned from the PRC to vote.  This is not a great number for the KMT.

Since the early 2000s, at any point in time, there are around 1 million people from ROC living in the PRC.  At the peak (2004 and 2008) around 500K voters from ROC living in PRC will return to vote.  This number has been going down since but 200K is a disappointing number for the KMT. 

200K will be around 1.5% of the electorate that most likely were not sampled by polling.   With some of the vote going to TPP you figure the KMT will at best net around 0.7% vis-a-vis DPP.   It is something but less than what the KMT would hope for.

[jaichind]

Size of the electorate by age

20-30    14.5%
30-40    16.5%
40-50    20.0%
50-60    18.0%
60+      31.0%

These numbers show why it is so hard for TPP Ko to ever win even in a 3 way race.  20-30 and 30-40 turnout are lower than older votes and only in 2020 did that gap close somewhat.  Even if 20-30 and 30-40 turnout matches that of older votes that would be enough for TPP Ko to potentially come in second but not enough to win.

[jaichind]

The most likely scenario is KMT Hou to narrowly lose.  At least for the 2026 local elections, the KMT can win by losing. 2026 could be a pretty good year for the KMT if it is in opposition but will be a potentially disastrous year if the KMT is the ruling party.

Likely 2026 ratings relative to the scenario of DPP vs KMT being the ruling party

                                                                   Current      2026(DPP)     2026(KMT)
Fujian Province
  連江縣(Lienchiang County)  (Blue+38)              KMT           KMT              KMT
  金門縣(Kinmen County)      (Blue+37)         KMT rebel   lean KMT      lean KMT rebel

Taiwan Province
花蓮縣(Hualien County)        (Blue+20)             KMT            KMT             KMT
臺東縣(Taitung County)        (Blue+18)              KMT            KMT            KMT
新竹縣(Hsinchu County)       (Blue+12)              KMT           KMT             KMT
苗栗縣(Miaoli County)          (Blue+11)         KMT rebel    KMT rebel      KMT rebel    
基隆市(Keelung City)            (Blue+7)               KMT           KMT             KMT
南投縣(Nantou County)         (Blue+5)              KMT            KMT             KMT
澎湖縣(Penghu County)         (Blue+4)              DPP        lean KMT          DPP
新竹市(Hsinchu City)             (Blue+3)              TPP        lean TPP        lean TPP
彰化縣(Changhua County)      (Even)                 KMT          KMT            tossup
嘉義市(Chiayi City)                (Green+4)           KMT         tossup           DPP  
雲林縣(Yunlin County)           (Green+6)           KMT         tossup        lean DPP
宜蘭縣(Yilan County)             (Green+6)           KMT         tossup           DPP
屏東縣(Pingtung County)        (Green+6)           DPP      lean DPP          DPP
嘉義縣(Chiayi County)            (Green+8)          DPP       lean DPP          DPP


Special Municipalities
臺北市(Taipei City)                (Blue+4)              KMT         KMT             KMT
桃園市(Taoyuan City)            (Blue+4)              KMT          KMT            KMT
新北市(New Taipei City)         (Blue+1)             KMT          KMT           tossup
臺中市(Taichung City)            (Blue+1)             KMT          KMT          lean KMT
高雄市(Kaohsiung City)          (Green+6)          DPP         lean DPP         DPP
臺南市(Tainan City)                (Green+11)        DPP         lean DPP         DPP

2022 was a disastrous year for the DPP and 2026 might be even worse for the DPP if DPP Lai wins tomorrow potentially losing 高雄市(Kaohsiung City) or 臺南市(Tainan City) which is a poor exchange in potentially flipping back a couple of rural counties and the KMT couple flip a couple of rural counties as well.  2026 will be very bad for KMT if KMT Hou wins mostly based on reversion to the mean.

[GM Team Member and Deputy PPT WB]

is it reasonable to draw some parallels between this and 2000's election? Blue splits with an independent/3rd party candidate who gets a decent bit of green support but mostly takes from blue, causing the DPP candidate to win?

[jaichind]

is it reasonable to draw some parallels between this and 2000's election? Blue splits with an independent/3rd party candidate who gets a decent bit of green support but mostly takes from blue, causing the DPP candidate to win?

It is.  Many ROC political commenters often talk about the 2000 election in comparison to this election.  The main difference is the Blue-Green balance has shifted toward the Green side since 2000 and the fact that this race is this close is only because TPP Ko able to draw some Light Green youth vote that, all things equal, would vote DPP over KMT.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Is it crazy to say the KMT losing this election would be good news for the KMT?

[jaichind]

Voting is to start soon and will end at 4PM.  No exit polls.

For the Prez race, for the first hour, every network will pretty much "make up" numbers to keep their viewers glued to their channel (so pro-KMT channels will have a pro-KMT "count" bias while pro-DPP channels will have a pro-DPP "count" bias).  After around 5PM most channels will start to converge.

The legislative races will take longer to count and the PR count will be the slowest.

While TVBS is pro-Blue their count will be the most "rational" out of the channels that "make up" the numbers.  You can go with ROC Public Channel to get a slower but accurate count but for the first hour, their numbers will be way behind which makes it not fun to watch them

TVBS live stream
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p8gVlJLmnw&ab_channel=TVBSNEWS

pro-KMT UDN claims they will have some model to "predict" the results based on the numbers coming in
https://udn.com/vote2024/open

[jaichind]

Final prediction

Prez race - no reason to change my prediction from a couple of weeks ago as the dynamics of the change did not change and there is no sign of a TPP collapse
DPP Lai      40
KMT Hou    38
TPP Ko       22



Legislative race

District race (73):  KMT+ 41  DPP+ 32 - I am doubling down the KMT-TPP consolidation factor over the DPP incumbency factor in the North and Central regions

Aborigine (6): KMT+ 5 DPP 1 - I convinced myself that the pan-Blue forces will coordinate their vote correctly in the Mountainous Aborigine to sweep all 3 seats and flip back the seat they lost to DPP in 2020.

PR (34): KMT 14 DPP 13 TPP 7 - I can see TPP winning 8 at the expense of DPP or KMT

PR Vote share
KMT      37.4
TPP       20.5
NPP        2.4
DPP      34.6
TSP        2.2

Total (113) KMT+ 60 DPP+ 46 TPP 7 (workable KMT majority)

[jaichind]

Is it crazy to say the KMT losing this election would be good news for the KMT?

As long as
a) KMT+ captures the majority in the Legislature
b) TPP Ko is pushed to third place by a wide margin eliminating him and TPP as a real factor in 2028  

If it was up to me I would accept a narrow KMT Hou loss as long as TPP Ko is kept below 20.  In fact, I rather trade in the KMT Hou gap with DPP Lai for a greater KMT Hou gap with TPP Ko.  In other words. I, and most likely the KMT, rather have

DPP Lai     43
KMT Hou   39
TPP Ko      18

and I, most likely the KMT, rather not have

DPP Lai    35
KMT Hou  33
TPP Ko     32

with the caveat that in the first scenario, the KMT+ still wins a majority in the legislature

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

What's the best case for the NPP?

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Do you think that the Ma Ying-jeou interview is going to embolden the DPP base to turn out and vote?

[jaichind]

What's the best case for the NPP?

At best 4% of the PR vote. Most likely less then that

[jaichind]

Do you think that the Ma Ying-jeou interview is going to embolden the DPP base to turn out and vote?

At the margins

[jaichind]

Turnout patterns seem to lean South which is good for DPP Lai.  It could be pro-Ko turnout but it is certainly not good news for KMT Hou.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Polls closed. I guess this page will get results in an hour.

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-taiwan-election/

[CascadianIndy]

First returns coming in hot and heavy - looks closer to a threeway fight than a two-way DPP-KMT street brawl. Does anyone know if certain parts tend to count first which skew the vote?

[jaichind]

So far it looks like

TPP Lai     36
TPP Ko     32
KMT Hou  32

TPP Ko outperformance

[jaichind]

TVBS has it at

DPP Lai   36.8
KMT Hou  31.8
TPP Ko     31.3

[jaichind]

TVBS now has it at

DPP Lai       37.4
KMT Hou     32.3
TPP Ko        30.2

Pro-DPP SETN TV has it at

DPP Lai       35.1
KMT Hou     32.8
TPP Ko        32.2

[jaichind]

One thing is for sure, all those TPP internals that show the gap between TPP Ko and KMT Hou as very close and mocked by me ended up being fairly accurate.

I suspect the PR seat count will now look something like

KMT   13
DPP    12
TPP      9