Taiwan's opposition parties used the National Day speeches to pressure the governing team, highlighting continued escalation in the standoff between the executive and the legislature — a source of political pressure for the Lai Ching-te administration.

• Legislative Yuan Speaker Han Kuo-yu singled out the Executive Yuan at the National Day ceremony for harming democracy by declining to countersign legislation, and Taiwan People's Party Chairman Huang Kuo-chang said this reflected what many members of the public feel.
• Huang Kuo-chang called on Lai Ching-te and Premier Cho Jung-tai to take the advice on board and to treat defending democratic constitutional government as a shared responsibility.
• Ko Wen-je shifted the focus to economic security, saying that amid the US-China confrontation Taiwan must safeguard semiconductors, a world-class pillar of its economy.
• He also questioned the pace of arms procurement: only two of the F-16Vs purchased from the United States have been delivered, and it remains unclear whether the special defence budget can secure the equipment smoothly.
• Ko Wen-je criticised the practice of labelling anyone who raises questions a "fellow traveller of the Chinese Communist Party", calling it a poor approach to governing.

Outlook: the countersignature dispute and the special defence budget will become the focus of the next wave of conflict between the governing and opposition camps, and the same lines of attack will carry over into local election campaigns.