Washington, D.C., is not in the future for the family of first-term U.S. Rep. Kai Kahele, but he faces an uncertain path if he decides to run for governor in August instead of pursuing reelection to Congress.

Kahele appeared on the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s “Spotlight Hawaii” livestream program earlier this month and was asked whether he is planning a run for governor.

“Stay tuned and we’ll see,” he said. “I’m giving serious thought to this.”

Kahele and his family were in Washington for his swearing-in ceremony and for the inauguration of President Joe Biden during the Jan. 6, 2021, siege on the U.S. Capitol.

The deadly riot by supporters of former President Donald Trump to disrupt congressional certification of Biden’s election “had a major impact on my wife and my kids,” Kahele told “Spotlight Hawaii” on Feb. 9. “We were blocks from the Capitol on that day. As a family, we’ve decided that that’s not some place right now that we would like to raise our family in and that the best place that my family can be is here in Hawaii, in Hilo.”

His wife, Maria, and their 5- and 7-year-old daughters live in Hilo, and Kahele was back in the 2nd Congres­sional District last week.

He declined to respond to questions from the Star-Advertiser about how he might see a successful gubernatorial campaign playing out.

“Congressman Kahele is not an announced candidate for governor,” Kahele spokesman Michael Ahn said in a statement to the newspaper. “Until he makes a decision to run, he will not be answering any questions related to the 2022 Hawai‘i gubernatorial election.”

There are only six months until the Democratic primary, and Kahale faces several obstacles if he were to announce a candidacy between now and then, said Colin Moore, director of the University of Hawaii’s Public Policy Center.

“He’ll be fighting an uphill battle, and it’s already a crowded field,” Moore said.

Kahele’s campaign reported $445,529 in campaign contributions to his congressional campaign at the end of 2021, leaving him with $482,996 in cash on hand.

“But that’s for a federal election, and he can’t move that for a statewide race,” Moore said. “If he wants that money, he has to return it and ask for it back to his state campaign. That’s really hard, especially if it was from national people who would be less inclined. There are Democratic (political action committees) that are not interested in the Hawaii governor’s race.”

For the same reporting period, the Friends of Kaiali‘i Kahele also reported $48,003 cash on hand to the state Campaign Spending Commission.

But that’s not much to run a statewide campaign for a candidate with low name recognition, Moore said.

The Star-Advertiser’s Hawaii Poll asked registered voters in January whether they recognized and approved of nine isle politicians. Kahele had the second-highest percentage of respondents who did not recognize his name: 25%.

The Hawaii Poll was conducted Jan. 24-28 by telephone by Mason-Dixon Polling &Strategy of Washington, D.C. It included 800 registered Hawaii voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

“His name recognition is a challenge, and he’ll have to raise money to raise that name recognition,” Moore said. “Running across the whole state is not easy, and a lot of the best fundraising firms are already committed to other candidates.”

Kahele would face Lt. Gov. Josh Green, the early front-runner in both fundraising and voter approval; business entrepreneur and former first lady Vicky Cayetano; and possibly former Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell.

Green raised $774,616 between July 1 and the Dec. 31 fundraising reporting deadline — nearly $300,000 more than Caye­tano.

Cayetano reported $475,274 in fundraising, including $350,000 that she lent her campaign.

In all, Green reported $1,125,878 in cash on hand. Cayetano reported $655,407 in cash on hand.

The Hawaii Poll also found that Green has an impressive 65% overall approval rating among Hawaii voters, and a whopping 70% approval for his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Both Green and Kahele represented Hawaii island districts in the state Senate. More recently, the Hawaii Poll found Green’s overall approval rating the highest on Hawaii island and among Native Hawaiians, both at 71%.

“Declaring so late with not a lot of money and the challenge of going up against one particular candidate who looks rather formidable is a gutsy move, especially because Kai Kahele has never run a statewide race,” said political analyst Neal Milner. “As far as being elected, you should want to be Josh Green and not Kai Kahele. You’ve got to really hate Washington to not run for a second term in Congress. But there may be some people whispering in his ear to jump in (to the governor’s race). And young guys take chances.”

Kahele played volleyball for the University of Hawaii and was a member of teams that went to back-to-back NCAA Final Four tournaments in 1995 and 1996.

Following the death of his father, state Sen. Gil Kahele, Gov. David Ige appointed Kai Kahele to fill his father’s seat in 2016, representing Hilo. Kahele won reelection in 2016 and 2018.

Along the way, he fought in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom as a C-17 Globemaster III and C-130 Hercules pilot. He remains a lieutenant colonel in the Hawaii Air National Guard, based out of Joint Base Pearl Harbor-­Hickam.

He also continues to fly Airbus A330 widebody planes on domestic and international routes for Hawaiian Airlines.

Most recently, Kahele has been an outspoken critic of drinking water contamination from the Navy’s Red Hill underground fuel storage tanks, even though his congressional district does not include Red Hill. His district encompasses the neighbor islands and rural Oahu, including Waimanalo, Kailua, Kaneohe, the North Shore and the Leeward Coast.

But Kahele is a member of the House Armed Services Committee, which has oversight of the U.S. military.

The consensus among county and state officials is that the responsibility and costs for cleaning up Red Hill rests on the military and federal government, not on Hawaii taxpayers.

So if Kahele chooses to run for governor, Moore said he’ll have yet another challenge to overcome:

“Kai Kahele’s going to have to explain to voters why he’s more useful here running for governor rather than serving in Washington, where he can be a real spokesman for the state |regarding cleaning up Red Hill.”