HONOLULU (KHON2) — Hawaii Governor Josh Green is headed to Washington, D.C., on Monday, May 19, hoping to convince the President to ease tariff impacts on the islands.
“Hawaii does not want tariffs in general, and our small businesses don’t need them,” Gov. Green said of his upcoming trip. “Again, that’s something I’ll try to impress upon the President, and I have already spoken with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent last week or two weeks ago, and I think it will settle down.”
This comes just days after the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization released a forecast that projected a mild recession due to federal policies.
“If the tariffs do cause a slowdown, we could see two or three quarters of recession, and that would affect us because if travelers don’t travel, if they don’t come to Hawaii, we’re seeing a kind of a little dip right now in international travel. It, of course, could hurt our bottom line,” Gov. Green said.
The Governor is also encouraging Canadians to consider policy differences between the state and federal governments.
“I wanna say to Canadians out there, I love you guys. I love Rush, and I love hockey. Please keep coming to Hawaii. We are not a part of that discussion.”
Another aspect of his trip will be speaking to lawmakers at the Homeland Security Committee’s discussion about vaccinations. He also hopes to lobby for avoiding Medicare cuts, which have been a prominent part of Republican negotiations in the House of Representatives.
“Right now, they’re litigating whether or not the COVID response was authentic and whether it was needed,” Gov. Green said. “I’m going to follow five individuals that have been called by the majority, and then I’m going to rebut their testimony and talk about what we saw in Hawaii, how we came together, how we were careful with mask wearing. Vaccinations were at ninety percent in Hawaii versus eighty percent, with the lowest mortality rate. We protected our kupuna. So, I’ll be sharing that information, and we’ll probably talk about vaccinations in general.”
More issues with the federal government were recently decided on, when the state’s land board rejected the U.S. Army’s extension of its lease of the Pohakuloa Training Area on the Big Island, leaving the future of the military’s training in Hawaiʻi unclear.
“We have to have the right environmental assessment,” Gov. Green said. “That’s why our Department of Land and Natural Resources folks felt that it was an inadequate assessment. That sends us to the next stage, which is how can we negotiate possibly a land swap that is beneficial to Hawaii. My feeling is there should be a smaller footprint overall, which is possible now with added technology. We do care deeply about our security presence in the Pacific. We also care deeply about the Aina. And most importantly, we care about our people, which is, in this case, the Hawaiian people who will feel that we’ve not been thoughtful about them or their history if we don’t cut the right kind of agreement. So all those things are in play. We have to be careful because now we as we go to a possible land transfer or land swap discussion, we still have to be mindful of the environment, and we also have to make sure that we don’t have the federal government just completely roll over us and take the land, through eminent domain. So this is a complicated one.”
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The Army’s land leases on Pohakuloa Training Area, Kahuku, Makua and Poamoho are currently set to expire in 2029.