About David Wu
David Wu was born in Taiwan and went on to serve in the US House of Representatives representing OR. David Wu's career in Congress began in 1999, during the late twentieth century, and ran through 2011, a tenure of 12 years. As a Democrat, David sat in a chamber where most colleagues were born in the United States; naturalized citizens remain a small minority of Congress in every era.
Taiwan reserves the ballot for its own citizens: non-native-born residents cannot vote in any election there, no matter how long they have lived in the country. In practical terms: Only ROC (Taiwan) citizens may vote. Non-citizen foreign residents have no voting rights at any level. That produces a striking asymmetry with the United States, which not only naturalized this member but then elected them to help write federal law. A naturalized American who returned to Taiwan would have no such political voice there.
Taiwan has sent 2 naturalized citizens to Congress in total, of whom 1 also served as Democrat like David. OR has elected 5 foreign-born Congress members across its history, so David's path from naturalization to Capitol Hill is not unique to that state — but it remains exceptional nationally. Across the full history of the US Congress, Taiwan ranks 15th of 38 tracked birth countries, accounting for 2 naturalized-citizen lawmakers.
Why does Taiwan's own voting regime matter on an American member's profile? Because it frames a question the US Congress itself wrestles with whenever immigration and citizenship come up: which countries extend the same democratic trust to people who arrived later that the United States extended to David? In Taiwan's case, the answer today is no — a naturalized American returning there would hold no ballot at all.