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Related: • Washington Journal: Jim Jeffords and Asian Americans • Power Play: Hawaii senators to gain chairmainships.

Power Play

Inouye and Akaka to gain senate chairs

By Greg Small/AP

Hawaii’s senators and their Democratic colleagues are poised to take over leadership positions, now that Vermont Sen. James Jeffords has decided to leave the Republican Party.

Sen. Daniel Inouye said on May 24 in Washington that he will become chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee, as well as chairman of the defense subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee and the Senate subcommittee on communications.

Sen. Daniel Akaka will chair the Armed Services Committee’s Readiness and Management support subcommittee, the National Parks, Historic Preservation and Recreation Subcommittee and the International Security, Proliferation and Federal Services subcommittee.

Inouye said that he doesn’t expect major changes on defense appropriations and Indian Affairs panels, where he has had a friendly relationship with both GOP chairmen.

However, Hawaii’s senior senator isn’t forecasting such clear sailing when it comes to judicial nominations by President Bush that must be approved by the Senate.

Inouye said only one proposed appointee from Hawaii, Randall Yoshida, has contacted him.

Yoshida, a former Honolulu deputy city prosecutor who served as attorney for the Bush campaign in Hawaii, is being considered for appointment to the U.S. District Court bench in Honolulu.

Inouye said he has never talked with Richard Clifton, a prominent Honolulu attorney under consideration for an appointment to the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Inouye complained that the White House and Hawaii’s Republican Party have kept him in the dark.

“I am not that partisan,” Inouye said. “If they want to be cooperative, then don’t treat me like dirt.”

As expected, Gov. Ben Cayetano, the titular head of Hawaii’s Democratic Party, and Linda Lingle, the chairwoman of the state Republican Party, viewed the power shift in the Senate differently.

“I think it’s a wonderful change for the Democrats in Congress,” Cayetano said.

“The chair is a very important position, and I think those of us who have experience in the legislative arena recognize that the chairpersons have power,” Cayetano said. “They can decide what is on the agenda, and they have a great deal of say in Congress as to what moves out of the committee.”

“We’re disappointed,” Lingle said. “We wish control of the Senate would have remained with the Republicans, because we think the changes [needed in government] would have come quicker. We think they will still come, but it will be a little slower now.”

Lorraine Akiba, chairwoman of the Hawaii Democratic Party, said the new version of the native Hawaiian recognition bill has a better chance of passing with Democrats in control of the Senate.

The original version of the bill, which would give native Hawaiians the same federal recognition as most American Indian tribes, passed in the House but never came to a vote before the full Senate after it was introduced last summer.