Did state Sen. David Ige really want to tax pensions? Was former Lt. Gov. James "Duke" Aiona actually behind teacher furloughs?
The answer to both questions is "no."
But that is not the impression left by a flurry of negative advertisements sponsored by mainland political action committees, also known as super PACs, trying to influence voters before the November election for governor.
Both Ige, the Democrat, and Aiona, the Republican, are forcefully countering the negative ads in the days before the vote. The rebuttals are delicate tasks, political strategists say, since the campaigns have to publicly repeat the negatives in order to clarify the record.
"I’ve been in office 29 years, and people who want to skew information to spin it in a way will do it," Ige said, adding that he believes voters are smart enough to understand the distinctions. "I guess that’s part of politics today. I’m focused on getting our message out."
Ige, the chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, inadvertently gave Republicans an opening on the pension tax issue when he awkwardly said at a debate this month sponsored by Hawaii News Now and the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that he had considered a pension tax and a general-excise tax increase to help close a projected budget deficit in 2011.
But it was Gov. Neil Abercrombie who had proposed the pension tax and the state House that had kept the issue alive as an option right up until the end of session that year. In the end, Ige and other state senators held out against even a small pension tax, and lawmakers ultimately agreed to temporarily suspend several GET exemptions on business activities to help contain the deficit.
AARP Hawaii, which fought the pension tax, named Ige the "Outstanding Legislator of the Year" in 2011, an honor based directly on his work against a pension tax. The Hawaii Government Employees Association, which also opposed the pension tax on behalf of the union’s retirees, adopted a resolution that expressed "heartfelt gratitude" to Ige and state Sen. Clayton Hee (D, Heeia-Laie-Waialua) for challenging Abercrombie.
Ige surgically used the pension tax as a political weapon against Abercrombie during the Democratic primary. But now the issue is being turned against him.
Some political analysts contended Ige would be more vulnerable for his backing of a general-ex- cise tax increase in 2011, an option that would have had far broader economic consequences for the state than a pension tax. While the American Comeback Committee, the super PAC tied to the Republican Governors Association, has criticized Ige on the GET in ads, the pension tax attack has had more bite.
"A pension tax is another example of a harmful policy that Sen. Ige supported before he changed his position, much like raising the burdensome general-excise tax that makes the cost of living worse for nearly everyone," Ted Kwong, a communications adviser for the Hawaii Republican Party, said in an email. "Senator Ige’s propensity for flip-flopping and the fact that he would even consider these ideas shows that he simply cannot be trusted on the issue of raising taxes."
For Aiona, the problem has been teacher furloughs.
He was lieutenant governor when Gov. Linda Lingle, the state school board, the state Department of Education and the Hawaii State Teachers Association agreed to teacher furloughs to help reduce labor costs during the recession. The teachers union preferred furloughs to straight pay cuts or layoffs.
While other state workers also took furloughs, teacher furloughs on classroom instruction days drew protests from parents and students and attracted national criticism. "Furlough Fridays" became the symbol of the state’s austerity during the recession and an unfortunate theme of Lingle’s legacy.
"It’s not fair," Aiona said of the negative ads. "They didn’t give the whole story. They’ve got to give the whole story. They’re making it seem like it was a unilateral decision. It’s not a unilateral decision. That decision was made by both the employer and the employee. And that’s what’s not being said.
"So they’re making it seem like it was all Gov. Lingle. That’s the other part of it. Gov. Lingle made the decision. I didn’t make the decision."
Aiona has said that, unlike Lingle, he would have met with parents who held a sit-in at Lingle’s offices at the state Capitol in 2010. But he would not say what, if anything, he privately told Lingle on furloughs or other policy issues when he was lieutenant governor.
In May 2010, during Aiona’s unsuccessful run for governor, he did publicly urge Lingle, the school board, the department and the teachers union to reach a compromise and end teacher furloughs. Aiona, as acting governor while Lingle was traveling, also signed a law in June 2010 backed by parents that mandated a 180-day school year, a response to furloughs.
The NEA Advocacy Fund, a super PAC of the National Education Association, the parent union of the HSTA, has sponsored negative ads against Aiona on teacher furloughs. Hawaii Forward, a super PAC linked to the Democratic Governors Association, also raised the issue and sought to tie Aiona to Lingle.
The Aiona campaign has responded with ads in which Aiona and educators refute the impression he created Furlough Fridays.
Wil Okabe, the HSTA president, maintains the issue is fair game. Okabe said Aiona could have spoken out publicly at the time if he was against teacher furloughs.
"To me, he cannot separate himself from being in the administration," he said. "He wasn’t a person that basically went out and said that he was opposed to it."
