Do we like Ma Ying-jeou?
Our score: 6 out of 10. No harmful words of his own turned up and he has beaten every court case we found, but his China stance is contested and the foundation feud is unresolved.
Ma was born in Hong Kong in 1950 to parents from Hunan, and the family moved to Taiwan the next year. He studied law in Taipei, New York and Harvard, then worked as English interpreter for President Chiang Ching-kuo. From there it was a straight climb: justice minister, two terms as Taipei mayor, KMT chairman, then president from 2008 to 2016.
His legal history is mostly a story of being dragged to court and walking out. He was indicted on embezzlement charges in 2007 over his time as mayor, and the courts acquitted him. On 31 December 2025 the High Court upheld a not-guilty verdict for him over the sale of three KMT-owned media companies, which prosecutors had alleged was below market value. His office said he was relieved and accused the DPP of pursuing the case for political reasons.
On the harm check, we found no words or campaigning of his own against LGBTQ+ people, women, migrants or the climate. We couldn't open enough reporting on his gay-rights record to judge it, so we're not leaning on it either way. What dominates the coverage is his China politics, and that's a contested-politics call rather than a harm one.
That China politics is the asterisk. In April 2024 he met Xi Jinping in Beijing, and in June 2025 he said in China that he backs “peaceful and democratic unification”. He also said Taiwan's people's will must be respected. Where you land depends on whether you read that as a pro-peace ex-president keeping channels open or as cosying up to Beijing while Taiwan's democracy is under pressure.
The recent drama is his own foundation. After an internal committee found no evidence of financial misconduct by ex-CEO Hsiao Hsu-tsen and Wang Kuang-tzu, Ma rejected the findings. His associates then publicly accused the pair of wrongdoing, including unrecorded cash bonuses. Hsiao denies it and plans to sue, and the foundation filed criminal complaints on 29 May. None of it has been decided, so it's all allegation at this stage.
On the good stuff, we couldn't open a source that lets us say much about charity or kind acts, and that's honestly a gap. What the record does show is decades in public office, including eight years as president and eight as mayor of Taipei.