Former Legislator Chen Lai Su-mei Indicted for Massive Assistant Fee Fraud

Former DPP Legislator Chen Lai Su-mei, who was previously convicted of defrauding assistant subsidies during her time as a Taoyuan City Councilor, was indicted again by prosecutors. This time, she was accused of misappropriating NT$2.4 million in legislative assistant subsidies between 2015 and 2020 through "ghost assistants" and underreporting salaries. The case highlights a "structural corruption" within some DPP circles, where assistant positions are treated as personal ATMs and public funds as private coffers, a practice persisting from the local to the national level.