Ige’s campaign to succeed Abercrombie not so quixotic

Renwick "Uncle Joe" Tassill sat outside state Sen. David Ige’s fundraiser this week, greeting all of the more than 200 supporters and telling them he wants voters to replace Gov. Neil Abercrombie with Ige.

"I tell them ‘I am the pebble,’ like the pebble in David vs. Goliath," said Tassill, who supported Abercrombie in his 2010 victory and was named a Hawaiian Homes commissioner by Abercrombie in 2011, but has since become disenchanted with the controversial Democrat.

It is a story being told over and over as a portion of Hawaii’s Democratic bedrock cracks under Abercrombie.

Across the country, incumbent governors almost always win and incumbent Democratic governors always win in Hawaii. But Ige, a 28-year Democratic legislative veteran, is gambling his political career that he can beat Abercrombie.

Ige held his first fund-raiser this week. The crowd of about 150-200 was made up of, as one political consultant at the gathering said, "a lot of loyal Democrats who are looking for a change."

Many were from the Gov. George Ariyoshi wing of the party — old-timers who had supported the three-term governor — although also attending was former Gov. Ben Cayetano, who declined to discuss whom he was supporting.

Dan Ishii, now a University of Hawaii vice president and an Ariyoshi assistant between 1976 and 1986 — he was described in David Yount’s book, "Who Runs the University?: The Politics of Higher Education," as one of the "youngest old boys in Hawaii" — is helping Ige.

"We can’t compete with Abercrombie’s money ($2.3 million) so we are going back to the old ’70s-style campaigning," Ishii said. "You know: just organizing the campaign, recruiting supporters, going out in the community finding supporters, is a type of campaigning."

The campaign, Ige said, can win with a budget of just $1 million. Today, there are only scraps in Ige’s campaign treasury, but he has won over Ariyoshi, one of the men who built the modern Hawaii Democratic Party.

Ariyoshi said Ige talked over his campaign with him, and after elaborating his concerns about the Abercrombie administration, Ariyoshi said, "I told (Ige) he has to become a candidate."

For a loyal Democrat such as Ariyoshi to stand in opposition to Abercrombie, the titular head of the state Democratic Party, shows how much the party has splintered under the former congressman’s leadership.

"I don’t like to critique another governor, but I think generally we are not heading in the right direction," Ariyo-shi said in an interview.

This dovetails with Ige’s thinking that the state needs leadership that appreciates the power of consensus.

"When you talk to people throughout the state, the current administration is tone deaf. They are dividing communities. They are imposing their vision on people," Ige said in an interview. "I’m running to give people a choice about what sort of leadership will best serve and that is resonating."

The rapid conclusion of the public worker contracts giving workers raises that have worried legislative leaders — although some of the increases were the result of binding arbitration, not negotiation — also has Ariyoshi concerned.

"The public employee agreements, they were reached in a hurry because in my judgment they wanted to make some deals with the public employee unions, and I am not sure they were properly negotiated to benefit the state," Ariyoshi said.

Bill Kaneko, Abercrombie’s campaign manager said: "Gov. Abercrombie made the tough choice to reduce state spending to address the $200 million deficit he inherited from the previous administration. That focus on fiscal responsibility and strong cash reserves helps to ensure the state is able to retain jobs, maintain services, and afford public employee contracts."

Ige comes to the race with a journeyman’s understanding of state government because he has chaired many of the state Legislature’s major committees. In doing so, he said, he has learned how to successfully navigate.

The debate between these two dramatically different types of leadership will propel this campaign.

Once thought of as a forgone conclusion, the race for governor with Ige’s entry could be one of the big moments in the 2014 campaign season.

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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.