HAWAII SUES TRUMP ADMIN FOR DISCRIMINATION … BUT HAVE THEY CHECKED THE MIRROR?

by Hans von Spakovsky, Conservative Review, March 15, 2017

Nate Madden of Conservative Review has outlined the problems with the latest lawsuit filed by Hawaii against President Donald Trump’s revised immigration order temporarily suspending entry from six terrorist safe havens. (Arguments are being held today in federal court.) But watching the attorney general of Hawaii, Doug Chin, condemn President Donald Trump’s revised immigration order as “blatantly discriminatory” was quite ironic, given that Hawaii is the home of a state government that constantly engages in blatant racial and ethnic discrimination.

Contrary to Chin’s outrageous claim, Trump’s new order does not discriminate against anyone, whether based on race or religion. Although Chin accused the administration of issuing an order designed to divide people into “a superior race,” it is Hawaii that blatantly discriminates to divide Hawaiian residents and create a “superior race” of Hawaiians entitled to special loans, low cost housing, and other privileges.

Attorney General Doug Chin should put his own house in order before he starts accusing President Trump of discrimination.

The state government has a special “Office of Hawaiian Affairs” (OHA). As its own website says, the OHA awards scholarship money to “Native Hawaiians,” as well as loans to “start businesses, improve homes, consolidate debts, and continue their education.” It also gives out grants and leases out land at very special, low rates to “Native Hawaiians.” To qualify, you have to prove you are a “descendant of not less than one-half part of the blood of the races inhabiting the Hawaiian Islands previous to 1778” according to the Hawaiian Home Commission Act. As Peter Kirsanow, a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, says, this is no different than the “odious ‘one drop rule’ contained in the racial-segregation codes of the 19th and early 20th centuries.”

In a highly critical 2005 report on the proposed Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act, the Civil Rights Commission said that Hawaii “is in a league by itself” when it comes to officially sanctioned discriminatory conduct. Hawaii has some nerve claiming that the revised executive order “differentiates between people based on their … national origin.” That is something the Hawaiian government does every day — differentiate between people based on their origin and whether they can trace their bloodlines back to 1778.

Attorney General Doug Chin should put his own house in order before he starts accusing President Trump of discrimination. He would be better off suing his own state government to stop its flagrant discrimination and its division of Hawaiian residents into two separate classes, one of which is given special privileges not available to anyone else.

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Hans A. von Spakovsky is a Senior Legal Fellow at The Heritage Foundation (heritage.org) and former Justice Department official. He is the co-author of “Who’s Counting? How Fraudsters and Bureaucrats Put Your Vote at Risk” and “Obama’s Enforcer: Eric Holder’s Justice Department.”