Hawaii GOP Candidate Duke Aiona Accused Of Having Ties To Hawaiian Evangelical Group (VIDEO)

Hawaii GOP gubernatorial candidate James "Duke" Aiona is the target of a new documentary-style video that intends to connect the Republican to an extreme evangelical group.

In the video, produced by Massachusetts blogger and journalist Bruce Wilson, clips of Aiona seen proudly endorsing and then later disavowing membership in the "International Transformation Network" are spliced with controversial footage of the group's assemblies.

In one passage, with no apparent direct connection to Aiona, a clip from the group's 2008 conference in Argentina shows Cindy Jacobs, a member of the group, aggressively preaching against "witchcraft" and "idols":

"Pastors, sanctify your people! You go and you tell 'em, if you have any idols in their homes we're gonna to burn 'em! If you have any witchcraft items in your homes, you bring 'em Sunday and we're gonna burn 'em! We're not gonna have witchcraft in this church!"

Aiona has recently accused L.P. "Neenz" Faleafine, social media director for Democratic candidate Neil Abercrombie, of tweeting links to a segment of the film, which he has described as misleading.

"[He] is spreading what I would call unconscionable, fabricated video attacking me and my personal faith," Aiona said, according to the Associated Press. "This politically motivated attack video takes quotes out of context, it splices videos together, it manufactures patently false statements as they relate to a faith-based organization."

Abercrombie spokeswoman Laurie Au, responded by explaining that the tweets were dispatched on Faleafine's personal Twitter account, and not by any official arm of their campaign. The video, she added, was also not produced in conjunction with the campaign, but served a valuable purpose to the people of Hawaii.

"Voters have been expressing concern that Duke Aiona is mixing religion with politics in a way that may not be appropriate in Hawaii today," Au told the Associated Press. "Our social media team, by sharing this information, did not engage in negative campaigning."

According to Bruce Wilson, creator of the video, in a blog post at Alternet:

ITN leaders claim to fight "witchcraft" and burn native art, depict non-charismatic Catholics as damned, try to cure HIV and AIDS with faith healing, and allege homosexuals are possessed by demon spirits.

Wilson also briefly explains the fruits of his research on the blog "Talk to Action":

Transformation Hawai'i is a local chapter of an entity called the International Transformation Network, whose leaders appear fixated on fighting gay marriage and burning "idols", "witchcraft items", Books of Mormon, statues of Catholic saints, and native art.

Wilson recently rehashed his allegation to AP:

"It would be hard for Duke Aiona to be more enmeshed in Transformation Hawaii," Wilson said. "I'm just observing, here's Duke Aiona. He's heavily involved with this movement. Here's what the movement believes."

WATCH:

Comments

[wdmax]

05:06 PM on 10/23/2010

Much like the deep south on the mainland, Hawaii is a backward isolated American territory (I know it's the 50th state, last and least) where you can stand anywhere and throw a rock in the four cardinal directions and hit at least two churches. The Christian missionaries did a thorough job in converting the islands, the ad will probably help Aiona's campaign.

[RockyMissouri]

07:04 PM on 10/23/2010

Between the cane farmers and the missionaries...the missionaries were the worst on natives EVERYWHERE--the ultimate betrayal of native peoples... They are spiritual, so they are easy prey for Christianity, having no need of it actually.....history will judge our actions in the Americas and in fact... ALL conquerers will be judged most harshly--as they should be...the actions of the past are always with us.

[barrada nicto]

07:44 AM on 10/24/2010

Hawaii may be physically isolated, but we're far from backward. Hawaii ranks high among the states in high school and college educated residents.

Hawaii is the most racially integrated state in the United States, with religious influences from many corners of the world. With such diversity comes much more than just tolerance. Many will likely be repulsed by the idea of destroying someone else's religious symbols.

[eternalscorpio1]

03:35 PM on 10/23/2010

Are there any normal,non-cult member republicans left in America?????

[eternalscorpio1]

03:24 PM on 10/23/2010

Great just what America needs ANOTHER whack job republican beliving in witches and fairies and faith healing from preachers, WTF are you doing to yourself America WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who needs Al Qeada when you have the GOP and the tea baggers destroying us from the inside out......

[barrada nicto]

03:27 AM on 10/24/2010

Republicans support the religious because they are easier to control. They will vote for candidates on the basis of one or two divisive issues, disregarding all else.

[JHKH]

02:57 PM on 10/23/2010

Aiona's campaign can feign shock and outrage that the accounts of his association and embrace of this radical christian movement was publicized through social media, and by someone associated with Abercrombie's campaign, but, the pertinent facts of the relationship were written up very clearly, citing sources, and with quotes in "the Moon Over Haleakala," a community newspaper on Maui, in September. These revelations were out weeks before the "surprise" publicity via Facebook (?), Twitter (?). I imagine Aiona's campaign figured the little Maui newspaper wouldn't attract enough attention to cry foul over, and they probably hoped the story would be too obscure and would not reach wide notice. Wrong.

[Catfish1968]

02:06 PM on 10/23/2010

He burned Hawaiian artifacts.

[RockyMissouri]

04:27 PM on 10/23/2010

That is a special abomination....burning sacred artifacts is evil--whoever does it....

[barrada nicto]

03:31 AM on 10/24/2010

Is there proof of that?

[ZubinTomato]

12:57 PM on 10/23/2010

These people believe that Eve ate the forbidden pineapple and that later Moses made Matzo out of taro root and spam.

[CarolinaYankee]

08:55 AM on 10/23/2010

He is attacking a culture that has been in Hawaii for Centuries, very dangerous.

[Catfish1968]

02:06 PM on 10/23/2010

and, he claims to be of Hawaiian heritage.

[CarolinaYankee]

08:53 AM on 10/23/2010

They burn books of Mormon? uh Oh, not good for some of their candidates like Romney is it?...

[GayGrandpa]

03:22 AM on 10/23/2010

And people were about the gays...THESE ARE THE PEOPLE THAT NEED TO BE OUTED!

[RockyMissouri]

07:06 PM on 10/23/2010

So very true....!

[ForVivi]

11:07 PM on 10/22/2010

Will lei's still be allowed?

[Vikingdave]

11:00 PM on 10/22/2010

Soooooooooooooooooooo Tired of Bible thumpers/ politians

[CarolinaYankee]

08:53 AM on 10/23/2010

When will the amendment for Freedom FROM religion be passed?

[YankeeCanuck]

02:09 PM on 10/23/2010

That we explicitly have no official state-sanctioned/imposed religion implies freedom of and from. Maybe we do need an amendment to spell it our more clearly now that some politicians are beating the bible, er drum for laws that reflect the "word of god." I prefer the word of dog. Dogs and Yanks know this stuff!

[RockyMissouri]

04:34 PM on 10/23/2010

We can pass it ourselves, and while we're at it...ditch that ridiculous and bogus 'Chamber of Commerce'...and appoint folks who are genuinely INTERESTED in advancing our nation...and who CARE about our suffering Americans....!

[trying2help]

08:39 PM on 10/22/2010

This needs to come out and be said. There is an extremely evangelical right wing group in Hawaii that would like to dominate the election. It's premise is only trust in God like the 15th centuray and all else shall at some time be revealed. One of the House candidates actually built himself an arc- waiting for Judgement Day. ( Rath)
Hawaii is very spiritual and does not need this right wing intimidating hateful form of religion. This clip did all a great service.

[poeticjustice4all]

08:33 PM on 10/22/2010

Who knew? I guess I won't be sending any more checks to the ITN.

[Kealadi]

08:19 PM on 10/22/2010

I have lived in Hawaii since 2001. And this is only one of many reasons why I do NOT support Duke Aiona: After 8 years of Republican rule, I watched as kids lost their education with "Furlough Fridays". Our education out here has taken a hit from 8 years of Republinomics, which don't work anywhere. This is a real issue! If kids get poor education, the whole nation suffers. Republican'ts want to cut, cut, cut! They would cut education, the Arts, Medicare, Social Security, the VA, and anything that would do regular people any good while bloating the pockets of the already rich, who sit like greedy dragons on their wealth and don't recycle it into the economy. When the public tries to get their fair share, the dragon scorches them with firey rhetoric, then lies about why Republanomics is great for America. If they get their way, kids everywhere won't know anything except what gets spoon fed to them...no limits on what. This would include brainwashing, something every totalitarian regime does with its youth.

[trying2help]

08:40 PM on 10/22/2010

Right on!

[barrada nicto]

12:30 AM on 10/23/2010

Well said.

[RockyMissouri]

09:25 PM on 10/23/2010

The Day the Earth Stood Still --can anything in our lives ever be as cool as that..?? Ernie Kovacs? Howdy Doody?

[marre]

06:11 PM on 10/22/2010

Why does this remind me of Tammy and Jim? Neil didn't put this out, he doesn't need to. Who in his right mind would vote for this guy?