On October 18, members of the Kuomintang (KMT), Taiwan’s important opposition celebration, elected Cheng Li-wun, a relative outsider to the celebration elite who campaigned on a platform of reform, as their celebration chair. Though turnout was comparatively low, the outcomes weren’t shut – Cheng secured a decisive victory within the six-way race, claiming a greater than 10 level margin over her closest competitor, former Taipei Metropolis mayor Hau Lung-bin, who had been extensively backed by the KMT institution.
Cheng’s speedy ascent within the KMT is notable for a number of causes. First, she was previously an energetic member of the KMT’s important political rival, the Democratic Progressive Celebration (DPP), which has gained the final three presidential elections.
As a college pupil, Cheng participated within the 1990 Wild Lily Motion – student-led protests that opposed the KMT’s 40-plus 12 months run of authoritarian rule and demanded direct presidential elections, amongst different targets. Removed from a reasonable inclined towards cross-party collaboration, Cheng was on the assertive finish of the DPP political spectrum on points akin to Taiwanese independence and opposition to the KMT. Cheng herself has said that she was a “Taiwanese independence fundamentalist” early in her profession, and pictures from pupil protests present her referring to the KMT as a “consciousless and brutal regime.”
Cheng labored in DPP politics for a number of years, holding positions in each the Nationwide Meeting – the precursor to Taiwan’s present legislature – and the DPP’s Youth Division. Her relationship with the DPP seems to have soured after the celebration’s first presidential victory. In 2002, the DPP suspended her after she publicly supported later debunked sexual misconduct allegations in opposition to a DPP official. Inside a number of years, she reemerged as a member of the KMT, serving as a legislator and later as spokesperson for the Government Yuan beneath then-President Ma Ying-jeou.
Regardless of holding high-profile roles, Cheng has restricted expertise successful campaigns. She held seats in Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan from 2008–2012 and 2020–2024, however each instances was elected through celebration record appointment quite than fashionable vote.
Cheng’s KMT chair victory can be notable as a result of her marketing campaign promised reform, positioning her in distinction to the KMT institution, which was considered resurgent after the unanimous failure of recall votes focusing on 31 KMT legislators this summer time. In marketing campaign path interviews, Cheng emphasised her want for a “reborn KMT” that reengages younger individuals. She additionally known as for an finish to “backroom offers” and “non-public anointing” of candidates – all pointed digs on the celebration institution, which has did not win Taiwan’s presidency in three consecutive elections.
Cheng paired her reformist rhetoric with an embrace of concepts that many within the KMT have grown cautious, just like the 1992 Consensus, an settlement between the KMT and the Chinese language Communist Celebration (CCP) that supplied a framework for cross-strait ties. Within the KMT’s bruising loss within the 2020 presidential election, voters expressed skepticism towards the celebration’s extra conciliatory strategy to China. Since then, the KMT’s outdated guard has spent a lot of its time preoccupied with reinventing itself for a Taiwanese public that more and more rejects unification and favors sustaining the established order. Consequently, Hou Yu-ih, the KMT’s 2024 presidential candidate, was initially hesitant to endorse the 1992 Consensus, which was as soon as the muse of the KMT’s cross-strait coverage.
Cheng, in distinction, lent unreserved assist to the 1992 Consensus throughout the race for celebration chair, referring to it because the “basis of mutual belief” between Taiwan and China. Whereas Cheng has been cautious in her use of exact political language concerning unification with China, a few of her statements – together with that she hopes all Taiwanese “will proudly and confidently say ‘I’m Chinese language’” and that either side of the Taiwan Strait ought to “be part of forces to succeed in new heights” – come notably shut.
Feedback like these, together with AI-generated disinformation campaigns focusing on Cheng’s important rival Hau, have fueled hypothesis in Taiwanese media that the CCP might have been supporting Cheng’s bid for the KMT chair. Allegations of Chinese language interference in Taiwanese elections are hardly new, however they’re most frequently levied by the DPP in opposition to the KMT, with the latter sometimes swift to dismiss these claims outright. Within the remaining week of the KMT celebration chair race, nonetheless, Jaw Shaw-kong, who was the celebration’s 2024 vice presidential candidate and had publicly endorsed Hau, overtly accused Beijing of intervening within the race to assist Cheng.
Such exchanges mark a break throughout the KMT’s ranks over its prior technique of largely dismissing claims of Chinese language interference in Taiwan’s elections. Some within the celebration institution – lengthy accustomed to assuming they get pleasure from Beijing’s favor – seem unsettled by stories that social media disinformation actions primarily based outdoors Taiwan might have supported an outsider like Cheng. Such revelations doubtless compound considerations throughout the celebration over hypothesis that Beijing favored Ko Wen-je, the candidate for the upstart Taiwan Individuals’s Celebration (TPP), over Hou Yu-ih within the 2024 presidential election as a result of former’s clearer positioning on cross-strait politics.
Even because the KMT has struggled with its post-2020 messaging, nonetheless, it takes satisfaction in its potential to interact in official dialogue with China. That has been an essential speaking level within the celebration’s efforts to persuade Taiwanese voters that the KMT is greatest positioned to supply peace. In distinction, Beijing has been unwilling to interact straight with the DPP as a result of celebration’s perceived pro-independence stance.
Regardless of Jaw’s accusations, KMT management has expressed a want for unity within the days since Cheng’s victory. As Cheng approaches her November 1 begin date as KMT chair, the query turns into how her reformist ambitions will fare as she contends with extra conventional members of her celebration.
Though her most essential duties will embody overseeing the number of candidates for Taiwan’s 2026 native elections and 2028 presidential election, an early signpost for her tenure is more likely to be whether or not she delivers on outgoing chair Eric Chu’s pledge to extend Taiwan’s protection price range to as a lot as 3.5 % GDP. Chu made this concession in June 2025, after members of the U.S. Congress criticized the KMT’s efforts to dam funding for Taiwan’s protection price range amid rising threats from China. On the marketing campaign path, nonetheless, Cheng criticized calls for that Taiwan spend extra on protection, noting that international locations akin to Japan and South Korea pay far much less for protection than President Lai Ching-te’s imaginative and prescient of 5 % GDP protection spending by 2030.
Protection spending apart, Cheng faces extra urgent questions over how she’s going to place the KMT in Taiwan’s ongoing political and institutional crises. Taiwan is approaching one other contentious budgetary season, wherein the DPP administration will suggest a price range that should win approval from the Legislative Yuan, the place the KMT and TPP collectively maintain the bulk – a feat that proved troublesome in 2025. Furthermore, Taiwan’s Constitutional Court docket has been unable to situation choices for practically a 12 months because of current KMT-led legislative modifications. This legislative and authorized paralysis not solely undermines the functioning of Taiwan’s hard-won democratic establishments but additionally weakens their potential to ship for all Taiwanese.
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