By Kalaniakea Wilson, Ph.D.
The State of Hawaii’s projected 2027 GDP (gross domestic product) is $136.9 billion. Seven billion dollars represents only 5% of the 2027 GDP, yet economic genocide policies continue to target wait listers for elimination.
A 2024 book titled Unconquered Non-European States published by Oxford University Press confirms that the Hawaiian Kingdom is the longest “illegal belligerent occupation in the world.”
In 2017, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands (DHHL) hosted wait listers and homestead association presidents at Humuula, Mauna Kea. Their vote supported security, gorse removal, ungulate management, and wait lister initiatives.
Jan. 13, 2018, at 8:08 a.m., a ballistic missile threat alarm sounded throughout the archipelago inciting pandemonium. I believed a nuclear strike was inbound and realized the Hawaiian race could end. After internalizing death for 30 minutes, we learned it was a false alarm. Following this event, 700 wait listers donated one dollar each to initiate the Kanaka Ranger program.
On March 26, 2018, Hale o Kuhio was erected in C1 of the Aina Mauna Legacy. The state approved Kanaka Ranger native ecosystem management on Mauna Kea, in Hana, Haena, then Waimanalo, collecting data to study visitor impacts.
Thousands of visitors and government officials stopped by to kukakuka including current OHA Chair Kai Kahele. His father, Gilbert Kahele, a civil servant legend for 33 years, died while waiting for a homestead. Another OHA trustee’s parent passed only days after receiving a lease. Examples of continued state- sponsored physical genocide.
June 2019: Hale o Kuhio was destroyed and replaced by a state law enforcement blockade a month later.
July 17, 2019: kupuna were arrested on Mauna Kea access road. Traffic tickets immediately targeted Kanaka protester vehicles adding to political and economic genocide.
In 2022, DHHL was awarded $600 million. DHHL Chair Watson has said that $6 billion is needed to house the entire wait list. In 2023, $328 million was awarded to Kalima case plaintiffs.
On March 26, 2026, Hale o Kuhio was rebuilt after a business plan was submitted in October 2025. The plan includes a toll booth, gift shop, parking lot, cultural eco-reforestation tours, food trucks, bathrooms, and a Kanaka Ranger training facility. A portion of the revenue will be used to stop the genocide. Wait lister and Kuhio organizations are working together inspired by Chair Watson and an all-star lineup of commissioners supported by Gov. Green. Mahalo to Makai Freitas, now serving as UH Board of Regent and head of the democratic party, for supporting $7 Billion to Stop the Genocide.
In the 2024 Kanahele case, the supreme court ruled the DHHL transfer of Mauna Kea Access Road to the Department of Transportation was invalid. The illegal transfer occurred a day after wait listers erected Hale o Kuhio.
All East Hawaii Homestead Associations and Commissioner support Hale o Kuhio to receive a commercial lease for Mauna Kea toll booth.
Why does Waimea Nui Homestead Association continue to compete with wait listers? Waimea Nui has homes with multiple projects supported by DHHL and already manages the Waimea side of Mauna Kea. Wait listers have no homes or projects.
Dr. Kalaniakea Wilson is a scholar of Indigenous politics, Hawaiian Kingdom law and genocide. He chooses not to use diacriticals. For more information contact: [email protected].
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