Are you sitting down?
The leader of the Hawaii Republicans in the State House of Representatives, Aaron Ling Johanson, has jumped ship. The “leader” with the extremely liberal voting record, the one who just won re-election as a Republican, has switched parties effective yesterday. The top Republican at the State Capitol has just become a Democrat. The person who has steered the direction of our elected officials at the state legislature (what to vote for, what to vote against, what bills to introduce, what Democrat policies not to fight) has admitted that he has been a Democrat all along. We were being LED by a liberal Democrat who just decided to come out of the political closet.
HIRA has been warning everyone about this guy for nearly two years . . . and we were 100% RIGHT. Aaron Ling Johanson IS a Democrat and has ALWAYS been a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Despite repeated admonitions from HIRA, elected Republicans ignored our advice and used their ‘better judgement’ to install Johanson as their leader since 2012. REALLY. This is completely true.
Johanson is NOT the only fake Republican at the State Capitol. More on that later.
Johanson made a not-too-veiled jab at the Hawaii Republican Assembly (HIRA) when he told the news media upon switching parties that: "Many in the local Republican party are becoming more narrow in their demand for ideological purity as well as in their demand for a combative tone and posture, I have decided to switch parties," In other words, he didn't want to fight Democrats -- he wanted their liberal policies to prevail unopposed . . . which is why he voted for the Obamacare Connector exchange for Hawaii, for higher taxes, for the wasteful, bloated state budget, and for so many other liberal policies while pretending to be a Republican and a 'fiscal conservative'. Apparently, Johanson regards anyone who doesn't agree with his beloved Democrat Party platform as "ideological purists" from the 'far right'. [Obama would be proud of Johanson's embrace of the strategy of demonizing Republicans with extremist rhetoric.] One must now suppose "Ling" thinks all real Republicans are idiots for wanting to change the way Democrats have run Hawaii on issue after issue.
So now the truth is out as Johanson – the REPUBLICAN LEADER IN THE STATE HOUSE FOR SEVERAL YEARS NOW – has revealed that all the liberal special interest money he received in exchange for pushing Republicans to support massive Democrat state budgets and other liberal policies were for the explicit purpose of sabotaging Republican efforts this entire time, so that Hawaii's Republicans would never rise to the occasion of calling Democrats on their failed policies and never organize opposition to their insane legislation. It's no wonder that Democrat unions and government employees like HGEA, UPW, HSTA, UHPA, Carpenters Union, and AFL-CIO have always loved Johanson and donated money and volunteer time to his campaign: They knew this whole time (like HIRA knew) that Johanson was, is, and always will be a Democrat.
Could there be any more obvious example of why Hawaii needs a conservative Republican organization like the Hawaii Republican Assembly (HIRA) to help clean house and expose when our party is on the wrong side of the issues and when our own party members go terribly astray and afoul of Republicanism???
So who has been covering for him this whole time since he infiltrated the Hawaii Republican Party and steered us in the liberal Democrat direction; setting back any efforts for reform by untold years? Beth Fukumoto has been covering for him this whole time along with fellow liberal Cynthia Thielen. Lynn Finnegan vouched for this guy to take her place in the State House when she decided to run for LG in 2009-10. Others like Pat Saiki and Miriam Hellreich have vouched for this guy too, despite his extremely liberal record in office, all the while pushing for our party to have a NEUTRAL position on all issues with a meaningless, empty platform known as LLIFE that gives Democrats all the wiggle room they need to create bad policies. Most importantly, DON'T let the recent missive from HRP leadership in response to Johanson's defection fool you. They have been carrying the water for this guy and doing it gladly for YEARS. Now they act surprised and hurt . . . sorry, no one is fooled. HRP leadership as far back as two years ago was told by HIRA that Johanson was an extreme liberal. They chose to ignore our analysis and vilify HIRA instead. Now it is clear; party leadership is either too incompetent or they were in on it.
In case you haven’t followed the news lately, ever since the 2014 election last month, there has been a struggle among the eight (now seven) state house Republicans about whether the caucus of elected Hawaii Republicans should be more conservative or continue to be more liberal, as they have been since Johanson took over the leadership as part of a pro-Souki liberal faction which made higher taxes, wasteful spending and gay marriage and so much more of the Democrat's radical agenda possible in recent years.
To resolve this leadership struggle of liberal R vs. Conservative R, Johanson went crying to Democrat House Speaker Joe Souki a few days ago. After some soul-searching, Aaron decided that his days as a spy in the Republican House were over. His cover had been blown. HIRA was ready to “out” him as a far-left loony, on issue after issue. So he jumped ship to join the same Democrats whose bills he has been voting for this whole time anyway.
- NO LOSS -
But the question arises, who’s next?? HIRA is taking bets on which liberal Republican will jump ship next. Will it be Cynthia Thielen, a proud Democrat in Republican clothing who even campaigns for her Democrat state senate daughter against longtime Republican Fred Hemmings? Will it be Beth Fukumoto, who makes a mockery of being a Republican each time she speaks out in favor of high taxes, wasteful spending and crazy liberal policies? Or will it be Lauren Cheape, whose love affair with the new tax on plastic bags and the Democrat state government budget are now legendary? These three Republicans, not coincidentally, were working to make the extreme liberal Johanson the leader for Hawaii's Republicans for at least another two years. CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW THIS WOULD HAVE SET BACK ANY HOPE FOR PROGRESS ON ISSUES THAT MATTER . . . to have liberal Republicans who support Democrat policies acting as full-time roadblocks to those of us who demand reform on issues from A to Z? Thielen, Fukumoto and Cheape were concocting a recipe for disaster by foisting Johanson on us for another two years knowing full well that he is a Democrat through and through. The time has come for REAL Republican leadership in the State House. More on that soon.
Lastly, for now, though it’s sad when a Republican turncoat shows his true colors and leaves us with fewer R’s in office (for now, not forever), the silver lining is that we are closer to being the party which we deserve to be: one which is not afraid to be conservative and which can attract those across the state who disagree with the way Democrats have mismanaged our state and our counties . . . to say nothing of our state's terrible representation by local Democrats in Washington, D.C.
Otherwise, if we don't fight for what we know we stand for, nothing will ever change. And the liberals will keep things just as they are. Just the way Aaron "Ling" Johanson and the rest of the Democrats want them to be. So join HIRA and start fighting today!
Please click "Forward email" near the bottom of this message in order to easily share this e-mail with friends and family, neighbors and co-workers.
