Office of Hawaiian Affairs Trustee Rowena Akana had vowed to fight ethics charges filed against her, and on Wednesday she did just that, filing a lawsuit that aims to block the effort.

The suit, filed in Oahu’s Circuit Court, accuses the Hawaii State Ethics Commission of violating Akana’s constitutional rights and of exceeding its jurisdiction and authority in dictating how OHA trust funds can be spent.

Akana is also seeking a temporary injunction to halt the commission’s action while the suit is played out in court.

The 28-year OHA trustee faces a fine of at least $50,000 after the commission filed a 50-count charging document alleging violations of the Hawaii State Ethics Code, including infractions of the state’s Gifts Law, Gifts Reporting Law and Fair Treatment Law.

The charges ding Akana for such things as accepting a $72,000 cash gift to help pay for legal fees and for using her trustee allowance to buy home cable television services, a home security system and an Apple iTunes Gift Card, among other things.

At a press conference in Honolulu Wednesday, attorney Steve Tannenbaum said Akana is fighting for the Hawaiian people by trying to protect OHA’s autonomy over its spending.

Tannenbaum accused Gov. David Ige and his administration of trying to seize control of OHA funds through its prosecution of Akana.

“The Legislature has dictated that OHA is the sole arbiter of its spending decisions,” the attorney said. “Here, in this case, 90 percent of the expenditure charges in the ethics commission complaint have been approved by OHA. That’s it. Once OHA has reviewed it and approved it, that’s the final say. No executive director of the commission or anybody else has the ability to second- guess or override those decisions.”

But Tannenbaum said certain OHA trustees who are politically opposed to Akana have sold out their constituents by cooperating with the commission as part of election-year shenanigans that aim to bring her down.

“In doing so, they’ve basically surrendering control of OHA funds by authorizing (commission Executive Director Daniel) Gluck to second-guess any and all decisions by OHA over their spending. This cannot happen. If this is allowed to happen, Gov. Ige will have taken over all control of OHA spending and OHA spending decisions.”

He added that rather than cooperating with the commission, the other trustees should be joining the case.

“They should be defending the rights of OHA autonomy over their own funds. Instead, they’re cutting off their noses to spite their own faces,” he said.

Tannenbaum said the Ige administration sees the OHA infighting as a chance to set a precedent to eventually wrest control of trust funds away from OHA.

The suit asks the court to compel the commission to establish new policies to prevent such abuses from happening again, he said.

Ige’s communications director, Cindy McMillan, called the assertion ridiculous.

“The Office of Hawaiian Affairs was created by the 1978 Hawaii State Constitutional Convention and has its own governance structure. The Ige administration has not been and will not be involved in OHA decision- making,” she said.

The lawsuit also alleges that the commission’s action violates her equal protection and due process rights under the Hawaii state constitution and infringes upon her freedoms of speech and association. It contends that Akana is being singled out for actions that other OHA trustees have engaged in but never had to face such charges.

Asked to respond, Gluck, the Ethics Commission’s executive director, offered this statement:

“The Hawaii State Ethics Commission has a full, fair, and thorough process for evaluating alleged violations of the State Ethics Code, and anyone found to have violated the Ethics Code has the opportunity to appeal the Commission’s decision all the way to the Hawaii Supreme Court if they so wish. However, the law does not allow an individual charged with ethics violations to run to court to try to short-circuit this established administrative process.”

In its charging document, the commission accuses Akana of improperly receiving more than $72,000 from Campbell heiress Abigail Kawananakoa to help pay for her legal battle against OHA from 2015 to 2017.

Not only that, but Akana was incomplete and late in reporting the gift and then used her official position to offer Kawananakoa “special treatment” in buying her a $125 floral gift, according to the commission.

In an earlier interview, Akana explained that her attorney told her she didn’t need to report the legal fees as gifts because trustees counter-sued her in her official capacity. But he later changed his mind, she said, saying it was better for her to be cautious and upfront.

Akana had sued OHA for the way it went about buying the $21 million Gentry Pacific Design Center, now home to OHA’s headquarters. The board majority countersued Akana after confidential documents found their way into the media.

Most of the ethics violations describe improprieties in the use of Akana’s annual allowance, including buying food for parties and OHA personnel, and making political contributions and donations to the Hawaiian Humane Society.

Akana is accused of using OHA funds to overpay her home cable bill, among other things.

The OHA Board of Trustees in February was criticized by the state auditor for its liberal personal allowance spending policy. In a report, the auditor described rules for use of the annual $22,200 trustee allowance as broad and arbitrarily enforced, resulting in many instances of questionable spending.