KMT legislator Ong Hsiao-ling described herself as "an upstanding Chinese person," and the remark was promptly picked up by Chinese state media as material for propaganda aimed at Taiwan — a negative outcome for both her personally and for the KMT's image.

• Ong Hsiao-ling was publicly criticised by an older male cousin for "already being Chinese"; in rebutting him, she stressed that she is Chinese in terms of bloodline, ancestral origin and culture.
• She said the Ong family came to Taiwan in the late Ming and early Qing period, with ancestral roots in Anxi, Fujian, and that the family genealogy and gravestones state this clearly.
• The remarks were immediately made into a graphic card by the Chinese state media outlet "Strait Today" and posted on Facebook, drawing 4,000 comments in which users traded insults.
• "Strait Today" is part of China Media Group, which falls under the Chinese Communist Party's Central Propaganda Department, and has always been a brand dedicated to propaganda directed at Taiwan.

Outlook: The controversy over identity is set to keep burning in the short term, and remarks of this kind being taken up by Beijing as united-front showpieces can be expected to happen again.