Hsieh Kuo-liang

Hsieh was born in Keelung, Taiwan, on October 5, 1975. His grandfather, Hsieh Ching-yun, was the owner of a prominent Keelung business cooperative, and his father, Hsieh Hsiu-ping, was a KMT legislator in the National Assembly who served as the speaker of the Keelung City Council. His mother, Lin Man-li, was an affiliate of the glass manufacturing company Taiwan Glass Group.

After attending Er-hsin High School, Hsieh graduated from the University of Southern California with a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in sociology in 2001. He then studied technology management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and earned a Master of Science (M.S.) from the MIT Sloan School of Management in 2003. His master's thesis was titled, "VC's Decision Factor in Semiconductor Investment." He later earned a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from National Chengchi University in 2012. His LL.M. dissertation was titled, "A study of an extradition dilemma in the ROC" (引渡困境之檢討).

After graduating from MIT, Hsieh worked for The China Post and founded Hualien Media International.

Hsieh is a Christian. He married Veronica Kuo Chung-wei, a former fashion model, in 2013. She was baptized a Christian in 2022. They have a daughter who was born in 2017 with congenital hearing loss.

Hsieh renounced his U.S. citizenship to contest the 2004 legislative election as a member of the People First Party. He joined the Kuomintang in 2006, and represented Keelung in the Legislative Yuan until 2016. In 2009, he proposed an amendment to the Computer-Processed Personal Data Protection Act that would make it legal for elected officials to examine personal records without informing the individual subject to investigation. The next year, Hsieh was named the co-chair of the Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee. In 2013, Next Magazine reported that he and a small group of legislators had been subject to wiretapping by the Ministry of Justice since 2011. Hsieh was the party's top choice to run for the mayoralty of Keelung City in 2014, after original candidate Huang Ching-tai's nomination had been withdrawn. He repeatedly refused the mayoral nomination and campaigned for Hsieh Li-kung instead. In February 2015, George Hsieh announced that he would not seek reelection, because his party had been soundly defeated in the November 2014 local elections.