State Rep. Elijah Pierick is no longer welcome at Saturday’s Prince Kuhio Parade in Kapolei after questioning why Ewa Makai Middle School has LGBTQ flags on campus.
The Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement on Friday issued a letter to Pierick (R, Royal Kunia- Waipahu-Honouliuli) saying that he will not be allowed to participate in the parade “because of his recent public remarks criticizing ‘Ewa Makai Middle School’s support of inclusivity for the LGBTQ+ community.”
“The LGBTQ+ and mahu community is an essential part of the fabric of Hawaii that we all know and cherish,” Kuhio Lewis, CNHA’s CEO and chair of the Prince Kuhio Parade, said in the statement. “Rep. Pierick’s commentary is hurtful, not aligned to the cultural values that we work to promote, and will serve as a distraction to honoring a true leader of Hawai‘i, Prince Kuhio. … We look forward to educating him on the significance of the mahu and LGBTQ+ culture in our community.”
The parade is scheduled for 5 p.m. to honor Prince Jonah Kuhio Kalanianaole, who was born in 1871 and served as Hawaii’s nonvoting territorial delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives in Congress, where he served for 19 years. He is credited with spearheading a law setting aside 200,000 acres of land to create homelands for Native Hawaiians.
March 26 is a state holiday in Kuhio’s honor, which will be observed Monday.
Pierick is a first-term legislator whose district doesn’t include Ewa Makai Middle School but is nearby. In an Instagram video last weekend, Pierick did not condemn the flags he saw during a March 13 tour of the school. But he asked viewers to call or email Principal Kim Sanders with their thoughts and provided her phone number and email.
“And you might be thinking to yourself, ‘What does that flag actually represent?’” Pierick asked in the post. “‘What is it conveying to our middle school students?’ This is what it means: lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual plus. Are these the kinds of concepts and lifestyles we want to be conveying to our middle school students every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday all year round? Or should this be a conversation geared toward the home?”
State Sen. Kurt Fevella (R, Ewa Beach-Ocean Pointe-Iroquois Point) worked as a custodian at the school and posted a Facebook video calling on voters to reject Pierick if he runs for reelection in 2024.
Fevella said teenagers contemplate suicide, drugs and alcohol abuse because they don’t feel safe at school, at home and in their communities. He said they need to feel safe.
“We are losing our children, Facebook fam, because we get people like that. We get people like that judging our community,” Fevella said.
He also praised Sanders, his former boss, and called Pierick “rubbish” and a “hater” and asked him to apologize.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.
