Public financing for Hawaii political campaigns again has become an issue this year with U.S. Rep. Kai Kahele announcing that he is now eligible for state campaign funds for his gubernatorial run by raising $100,000 through individual donations of $100 or less.

When he announced his candidacy May 7, Kahele pledged that he will not accept donations above $100 from corporations, unions and political action committees as he had in the past.

Kahele had few options to finance his late-hour gubernatorial run because he is prohibited from using any of his congressional campaign donations in a state race.

But Kahele’s announcement this week that he has raised the state’s minimum of $100,000 to become eligible for state campaign funds means that the pace represents “the fastest any gubernatorial candidate has reached the $100,000 threshold since public financing’s inception in the 1980s,” according to a statement from his campaign.

It also indicates grassroots support because he will have generated a minimum of 1,000 relatively small donations, said Colin Moore, director of the University of Hawaii’s Public Policy Center.

“I think that’s a good sign for his campaign,” Moore said.

If Kahele’s donations are verified, he would qualify for as much as $207,000 in public campaign funding from the state’s general fund for the Aug. 13 Democratic primary election, said Kristin E. Izumi-Nitao, executive director of the state Campaign Spending Commission.

If he should win the primary, Kahele could theoretically qualify for another $207,000 in state campaign funds for the Nov. 8 general election by a second round of donations of $100 or less.

By comparison, Lt. Gov. Josh Green’s gubernatorial campaign estimates that he has raised more than $2.5 million from approximately 2,500 donors ahead of the June 30 deadline for campaign finance disclosures.

It’s not unheard of to win high office just using what’s known as “partial public financing,” as Gov. David Ige did in his successful 2014 challenge of then-Gov. Neil Abercrombie, but not in Ige’s reelection bid.

In 2020, 16 candidates relied on public campaign funds and three won, although the Campaign Spending Commission could not immediately identify which ones.

Candidates who apply for public campaign funds also can accept maximum donation amounts above $100, but the larger contributions do not count toward reaching minimum levels to qualify for public funds.

The Hawaii Election Campaign Fund was created during the 1978 Constitutional Convention and established by the state Legislature in 1979.

The source comes primarily from the state general fund and the amount is determined by how many income tax filers indicate on their returns that they want $3 to go into the fund. The indication does not affect the amount that individual tax filers owe or the size of any refunds.

The rules are complicated and vary by race, and even differ between individual City Council and House and Senate district races depending on the number of votes cast in the previous election cycle.

The amount of public campaign funds that are dispersed also varies wildly and often goes up in election cycles where a gubernatorial candidate may tap into them, Izumi-Nitao said, such as the total of $234,864 dispensed during Ige’s first gubernatorial campaign.

In 1980, the first year of public campaign financing, the state distributed only $1,000. The amount skyrocketed to $427,721 in the 1982 election cycle and then bounced up and down in the years since.

Then in the 2020 election year, candidates tapped the fourth-lowest amount ever, $85,361.

Adjusted for inflation, Moore calculated that the state financed $1.3 million in campaign financing in 1982 and just $96,000 in 2020.

“That’s 13 times more when adjusted for inflation,” Moore said.

Typically, each election cycle results in over 300 candidates, with about 100 newcomers, Izumi-Nitao said.

Moore believes the low amount of public campaign financing in 2020 could be the result of lack of awareness among new candidates and because the rules are so complex.

Candidates who accept public campaign funds face spending caps that also vary by race: $2,081,165 for each of the primary and general elections for governor; $1,165,452 for the lieutenant governor’s elections; and $1,099,870 for the Honolulu mayor’s race compared with $94,206 for the Kauai mayor’s race.

The amount of allowable campaign expenditures also differs among similar races. For instance, the level of allowable campaign expenditures ranges from $59,111 in Honolulu Council District 7 (lwilei to Foster Village) to $102,694 in District 4 (East Honolulu to Waikiki); and also between each House and Senate race.

Violations can result in a fine of $1,000 and the return of all public campaign funds.

For new candidates, Izumi-Nitao said, “it is a steep learning curve.”

Common Cause Hawaii has pushed for campaign spending reforms in the state Legislature, including more transparency regarding who donates to PACs and Super PACs.

Raising the amount that candidates can receive in public funding would reduce their reliance on so-called dark money, said Sandy Ma, executive director of Common Cause Hawaii.

Public campaign financing tends to help political challengers, she said, and reforms continue to die in the Legislature.

“It is hard to go out there and fundraise,” Ma said.

With more and more easily accessible public campaign funds, “More people are able to run for office and you can have more responsive people running for office,” Ma said. “This is a way to get big money, dark money, out of politics and makes … people who are elected more responsive to the voters. Improving our election system is important.”

TO LEARN MORE

For a guidebook on public campaign financing, visit bit.ly/3ObPiDi