MAUNA KEA KIA`I OPPOSE CLARE CONNORS AS US ATTORNEY
Hawai`i News Now - October 27, 2021
Some Native Hawaiians are objecting to President Joe Biden’s choice for U.S. attorney in the 50th state, saying Clare Connors treated dozens of elders like criminals when her office prosecuted them for blocking a road while protesting the construction of a telescope in Hawaii.
“She has acted aggressively towards the Hawaiian people during all of our stand for Mauna Kea,” said Kealoha Pisciotta, one of the protest leaders.
Pisciotta and other Native Hawaiians who oppose the telescope believe the summit of Mauna Kea is sacred. They say building the Thirty Meter Telescope on the state’s tallest mountain would further desecrate a place already defiled by a dozen other observatories.
The 38 Native Hawaiian elders prosecuted for obstruction were in their 60s through 80s and many of them are community leaders. Four were found not guilty in August. One was found guilty last month after a separate trial, fined $500 and sentenced to one day in jail, which he won’t have to serve if he avoids further violations for the next six months. The other cases are pending.
Pisciotta said she’s concerned about Connors being named U.S. attorney because Native Hawaiians have been deprived of their land and their right to self-determination since the U.S.-backed overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893.
“I think of her as a danger to many situations in Hawaii because she doesn’t have to seem to have the compassion or the aloha that is needed considering our political situation,” Pisciotta said.
