(BIVN) – Governor David Ige has just unveiled a campaign advertisement featuring a Hawaii Island leader whose opinion carries a lot of weight on the Big Island.
Hawaii County Mayor Harry Kim has thrown his support behind the incumbent governor in a new video that focuses primarily on the way Ige came to the aid of Puna when Kilauea began erupting on the lower East Rift Zone in May.
Mayor Kim’s endorsement offers perhaps the best counter argument to Ige’s political opponents, who have attacked the governor on his leadership, especially in recent days. Congresswoman and gubernatorial candidate Colleen Hanabusa has derided Ige over the “38 minutes” it took “to cancel the false missile alert and the more than eight hours it took to alert authorities of a psychopathic killer’s escape from the state hospital,” as well as the most recent erroneous release of a detainee charged with the fatal shooting of a man in South Kona.
But with Mayor Kim, Gov. Ige has a political ally who has helped shoulder the burden on other difficult situations, like the future of Mauna Kea, the selection of a new Hawai‘i State Emergency Management administrator, and the response to the volcanic eruption.
“I’m saying ‘thank you, governor’ because he came through,” Mayor Kim says in the ad.
