China rallies for opposition as Taiwan gears up for mass parliamentary recall

TAIPEI - As Taiwan

gears up for a recall vote

that could reshape its Parliament, opposition lawmakers being challenged at the ballot box are getting two unusual supporters: Chinese officials and state media outlets rallying to their cause.

While President Lai Ching-te

won the election in 2024

, his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lost its legislative majority. The opposition has flexed its muscles since then to pass laws the government has opposed and impose budget cuts, complicating efforts to boost defence spending in particular.

The political drama has been happening against a backdrop of China ramping up its own military and diplomatic pressure campaign against Taiwan to assert territorial claims Mr Lai and his government resolutely reject. Mr Lai has offered talks with Beijing many times, but been rebuffed.

Civic groups formally started the recall campaign earlier in 2025, and on July 26 voters will decide on the fate of 24 lawmakers from Taiwan’s largest opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), around one-fifth of all lawmakers.

The recall groups say theirs is an “anti-communist” movement, accusing the KMT of selling out Taiwan by sending lawmakers to China, not supporting defence spending and bringing chaos to Parliament.

The KMT rejects those accusations, denouncing Mr Lai’s “dictatorship” and “green terror” - the DPP’s party colour.

China has not sat quietly on the sidelines, to the KMT’s unease, ever wary of being “painted red” by its opponents.

In June, two senior Chinese officials overseeing Taiwan policy denounced the recalls as a “political scheme” of Mr Lai’s.

Mr Lai is “engaging in dictatorship under the guise of democracy” and “using every means possible to suppress the opposition”, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian told a news briefing in June.

Taiwanese tycoon Robert Tsao, one of the most prominent recall campaigners, said such comments would only support their cause.

“It shows they (the KMT) are together with the communist party. It helps us,” he told reporters at a campaign event on July 21.

‘Our business’

The KMT says it neither asked for nor wants China’s support, adding that it cannot control what China says. The party denies being pro-Beijing, but says it needs to keep lines of communication with China open, and has denounced the recalls as a “malicious” attack on democracy that does not respect the results of 2024’s parliamentary election.

“We feel the same way as all the people of Taiwan – this is our business. It is the two parties, the DPP and the KMT, fighting for public support, for public recognition. It has nothing to do with the mainland,” party spokeswoman Crystal Yang told Reuters.

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office and Chinese state media have repeatedly commented on the recall vote and used some of the same talking points as the Kuomintang, Reuters reported this week.

Chinese state media outlets and their affiliated social media accounts published some 425 articles or videos describing the recall campaign as “dictatorship” or “green terror” in the first half of 2025, according to Taiwan research organisation IORG, which analyses Chinese state media.

In an April commentary, China’s ruling Communist Party’s official People’s Daily said Mr Lai was “presumptuously abusing the recall system to crack down on the opposition party, attempting to establish a ‘green dictatorship’”.

In a post on Facebook citing the Reuters report and research by IORG, Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council said it “rejects the Chinese Communist Party’s intervention”.

“The Chinese Communist Party’s attempt to interfere with Taiwan’s democratic operation is evident and clear,” it said.

“Recall in Taiwan is a civil right guaranteed by the Constitution, and it is up to the people of Taiwan to decide who should or should not be removed from office.”

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not respond to a request for comment. It has also not responded to questions submitted last week by Reuters about the recall and whether China was seeking to interfere in the outcome. 

Pointing to the similarity between China and the KMT’s arguments against the recalls, Ms Wu Szu-yao, secretary-general of the DPP’s legislative caucus, said Beijing is “offering ammunition” to the KMT to sway voters.

“China is really concerned that the mass recall will be successful and win the support of Taiwan’s public,” she said.

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not respond to a request for comment.

The KMT says its China engagement is vital given Beijing’s refusal to talk to Mr Lai, who it says is a “separatist”, and to advocate for Taiwan’s interests, such as promoting agricultural exports.

“This is an unfair criticism,” said Mr Tony Lin, chairman of the KMT’s Culture and Communication Committee, referring to the accusations they are pro-Beijing. “What we have always stressed is that we are pro-communication.”

The KMT hopes people will turn out to also express their dissatisfaction with Mr Lai, who they say is incompetent and has stoked tensions with China.

“The DPP uses its overwhelming propaganda network to bring up a sense of fear (about China) in Taiwan society,” said Professor Huang Kwei-bo, a professor of diplomacy at Taipei’s National Chengchi University and a former KMT deputy secretary-general. REUTERS