Chinese National Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (
Earlier yesterday, Ma had publicly denied having a green card, saying that "no members of his family possessed one."
In the declaration yesterday evening Ma said because his eldest daughter, Lesley Ma (
"However no other members of my family possess a US passport, not myself, my wife, or my youngest daughter, nor have we applied for one," he said.
Ma did admit that during his stay in the US he applied and obtained a green card, around 1977, in order to get student loans and employment after graduation.
He said that he ceased using his green card in the late 1980s and had applied for visas via the American Institute in Taiwan when traveling to the US, which "by American law, would be seen as giving up the green card."
"Both my wife's and my green card became invalid this way; my younger daughter, on the other hand, has never had a green card," he said. "Since both myself and my wife have given up our green cards for more than 20 years, when I was asked about it yesterday, I naturally said that I did not have a green card."
Earlier in the day, when he was approached for comment in Tainan, Ma said: "I've already answered the question and today's newspapers also ran stories with my response. No one in my family has a green card."
Ma then urged Hsieh to respond to a question he asked on Sept. 29 regarding why Hsieh could not urge the government to immediately allow direct cross-strait transportation and investment from China.
Ma said he always responded to Hsieh's questions quickly, while Hsieh failed to reciprocate.
Earlier yesterday Hsieh had raised the green card issue again.
"[Whether you have a green card] is such a simple question. Why can't Ma answer the question in person? If Ma lied about this, he should drop out of the election," Hsieh said.
Hsieh raised the same question on Sunday as he registered his candidacy, but it was Wang Yu-chi (
At a press conference held to declare his clean politics election platform, Hsieh persisted in questioning Ma, saying he would pursue the issue until Ma had provided a response.
"I didn't question Ma about the green card for no reason. Maybe he has spent the past two days trying to find a way with his lawyers to have the card revoked," Hsieh said.
"Ma keeps saying he is closely bound to the fate of Taiwan. If a presidential candidate holds a US green card or is able to apply for dependent status, it would be just like wearing a life jacket. His pledge was merely pretense," Hsieh said.
Later yesterday, after Ma had rebutted the allegations, Hsieh asked Ma to specify the date since when Ma and his family members had not had US green cards.
"Did Ma mean that he never owned a green card, doesn't have a green card now, or that his green card has been revoked?" Hsieh said.
Hsieh said his campaign office had obtained information from different informants and would make it public once it had been verified, adding that some of the information provided "quite detailed information," including the card numbers.
Meanwhile, Hsieh vowed to set up an independent government agency, modeled on Hong Kong's Independent Commission Against Corruption if elected.
Hsieh said he would also push for the passage of a series of "Sunshine laws" to create a clean political climate and advocate judicial reform.
Additional reporting by staff writer
A strong continental cold air mass and abundant moisture bringing snow to mountains 3,000m and higher over the past few days are a reminder that more than 60 years ago Taiwan had an outdoor ski resort that gradually disappeared in part due to climate change. On Oct. 24, 2021, the National Development Council posted a series of photographs on Facebook recounting the days when Taiwan had a ski resort on Hehuanshan (合歡山) in Nantou County. More than 60 years ago, when developing a branch of the Central Cross-Island Highway, the government discovered that Hehuanshan, with an elevation of more than 3,100m,
SECURITY: To protect the nation’s Internet cables, the navy should use buoys marking waters within 50m of them as a restricted zone, a former navy squadron commander said A Chinese cargo ship repeatedly intruded into Taiwan’s contiguous and sovereign waters for three months before allegedly damaging an undersea Internet cable off Kaohsiung, a Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) investigation revealed. Using publicly available information, the Liberty Times was able to reconstruct the Shunxing-39’s movements near Taiwan since Double Ten National Day last year. Taiwanese officials did not respond to the freighter’s intrusions until Friday last week, when the ship, registered in Cameroon and Tanzania, turned off its automatic identification system shortly before damage was inflicted to a key cable linking Taiwan to the rest of
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
China’s newest Type-076 amphibious assault ship has two strengths and weaknesses, wrote a Taiwanese defense expert, adding that further observations of its capabilities are warranted. Jiang Hsin-biao (江炘杓), an assistant researcher at the National Defense and Security Research, made the comments in a report recently published by the institute about the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) military and political development. China christened its new assault ship Sichuan in a ceremony on Dec. 27 last year at Shanghai’s Hudong Shipyard, China’s Xinhua news agency reported. “The vessel, described as the world’s largest amphibious assault ship by the [US think tank] Center for Strategic and International
RSS