 This is Think Tech Hawaii. The immunity matters here. Good afternoon. Welcome to Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers, and Reformers Politics in Hawaii series. I'm your host, Carl Kampania. Today's show, we're going to include a couple of things. We're going to have a Trump dump, which I haven't done in a little over a month now. And we're also going to have a good conversation with, really, someone who I want to phrase it this way. We have Mr. Tim Vanderveer, the Uniting Chair of the Democratic Party of Hawaii. It's an important understanding, and we can go into that later. But we're going to have a conversation about the summer of resistance with him, what the Democratic Party has been doing, and what you can do to help and be engaged in a part of what we're doing. So to begin with, we're going to go into a Trump dump. Those of you who have seen these before, you may be familiar with this, but we'll see how this go. So OK, I will start. I condemn the KKK, neo-Nazis, and white supremacists, for their organized hate and belief that non-white people are subhuman and inferior. These ideas should not be legitimized or allowed space for consideration. These ideas are not only anti-American. They are anti-humane. And let me say more. I do not condone violence in any capacity. It is important to say over and over again that the anti-fascist, anti-Nazi groups who stand in opposition should not resort to or encourage violence. Also, it's important to note that they would not exist without the KKK, neo-Nazis, and others. Furthermore, they would not have been in Charlottesville this past weekend if the white supremacist groups had not felt emboldened by Donald Trump and the GOP. Yes, Trump's administration defunded anti-white supremacy enforcement. Yes, Trump's base includes all white supremacists. Not all white people who voted or not all people who voted for Trump are racists. But every racist voter voted for Trump. Yes, the GOP owns the racism and division in this country. And as long as they continue to support Trump, they need to wear it with the shame and dishonor it deserves. And they can stop with the GOP propaganda about Dems not having a leader or a message. The GOP had no leader, which is how Trump took over. Then they committed the vile act of getting in line behind him, shame, nothing but shame. The Democratic Party message is and has always been, in my opinion, interpretation, fairness, equality, and justice for all people, not just those the elitist GOP deemed deserving. The GOP co-opted evangelical religion and racism in order to compete. It has been effective, but also shortsighted and reckless, as is apparent now, from Charlottesville to playing nuclear chicken with North Korea. The GOP fights to keep civil rights, health care, and economic policy exclusive to the deserving. Exclusivity is elitism. And again, the GOP exercises elitism with regards to the statutes that have been tumbling down and that are being taken down, either pulled down or taken down. We need to remember that the past, we need to remember the past so that we don't allow or repeat the awful mistakes and tragedy. For some, these statues inspire their continued hate. The statues, like art, do not support or endorse hate or love. But the enculturation of those who hate is fostered by some family, some community, and some politicians who fill in those hateful gaps by allowing the narrative as legitimate. Now, more than ever, we need a return to real servant leadership. It is time we return to creating laws and opportunities that benefit all, not only the highest bidder. Thanks to Citizens United, we currently have more of a patronage relationship with our legislators. This is bad for democracy. Long gone are the times of altruism and common good. We are instead expected to revere our politicians as all knowing and hope that our interests are served by their crumbs. The only reason to allow for career politician is so they don't have external careers causing potential conflicts of interest. We're missing the mark on that one, I think. Consider for a moment, what would the Declaration of Independence or the US Constitution look like if it were written by today's Congress? Most people fear a new constitutional convention because the very principles of democracy would be threatened and bought off. I want to know, where are the true statespeople to challenge power, to maintain country over party? I have hesitated ever calling name, even when Republicans consistently do, like libtards or snowflakes. Then they revert to Trump won, get over it, and all kinds of other gloating BS. The white supremacists have never gotten over the Civil War, have they? In my opinion, the GOP has lost all respect, and they cling, or as they cling, to their racist leader. Yes, I'm calling a name calling that. Republicans used to have honor. Now, not all of them, not anymore. If it's not the hypocrisy, it's the racism, or the blatant disregard for facts, the Russia probe, and continuous Trump lie. What will they say when the tide turns, when the collusion investigation is complete? Where is the true leadership, or where is the true leadership that is needed to unite the country? There was a time the GOP had honor and held strong positions on important issues, not anymore. The GOP has given up all semblance of moral high ground in my opinion. Their positions on issues have been proven to be false and outright lies. You can see both the ACA repeal and the Kansas State trickle-down economic fail of 2017. They have never admitted to, or even discussed, the Kansas failure, because they know it's a failure based in Ayn Randian selfishness and elitism branded as self-responsibility. The only other GOP issues are lies about climate change and the co-opted evangelical religious positions on marriage equality and abortion, which are only there as wedge division bells, just like racism. Truth is, the GOP seems to have no ideas. They have only said no to Democrats' ideas. And their so-called leaders know it. Seriously, when did they last have an original idea? Think long and hard about this. It's true. They are the party of no, and the anti, that, or the other party. Trickle-down economics is not new. It's supply-side economics defined long ago and shown to lead to the Great Depression. All they can say is, Trump won and have no answers. Only elitist, privileged, complaining. Sometimes the best deal is the one that was never made. All this being said, we will bend as a country, but not break. Trump's fire will extinguish, and we will bounce back. The system that is in place will outlast his ego, his bluster, and blind ideology. And with that, I conclude my Trump dump for today. The final thing I will say is, let's have a moment of silence for those who lost their lives in Charlotteville over the weekend, as well as the five soldiers who lost their lives last evening in a helicopter accident. One moment. OK. Now, what do we do? What do we do from here? What can be done? What is being done? For the rest of this show, I want to talk about that. I want to talk about the resistance, the summer of resistance in particular. And for that conversation, I welcome to the show Mr. Tim Vandevere, chair, the uniting chair of the Democratic Party of Hawaii. Welcome to the show again. Thank you so much for having me. Absolutely. Always happy to have you. Now, I know that not everything I said, everybody's going to agree with, but it's been percolating, so anyway. So I know that there's a lot that is going on. And not everybody sees it. Not everybody's aware of it. And that's one of the reasons why it's important that we have these conversations through every form of media possible. So from last year, we have the Women's March. We have J-20. We have Windward Resisters here in Hawaii. We have got Indivisible and many, many other groups across the country and locally. One of the things that I appreciate is the Democratic Party has decided, you know what? We agree with that, and we want to do our part. And what has come of that is the Democratic Party's summer of resistance. So can you tell us about the summer of resistance and how that translates locally and what's being done? Three questions there we'll build on. Sure. Well, I mean, in many ways, this is sort of a continuation of what we've been doing all along, since really before Trump was elected president, calling out his racist comments, calling out his inappropriate comments, be it about women or minorities or immigrants, and then obviously continued after the election all the way through the inauguration. Many of the folks that are in the resistance, we know, are members of the party. Those who are not obviously agree with many of the planks of our platform, and so this is something that we have tried to do as a party to be as inclusive as possible to continue to speak out when we know that there is something that is wrong, that either the president is saying or members of his administration are doing through policy, but also to have discussions, forums, educational meetings where we're talking about ideas to have alternatives, because as you said in your comments, we can't just be all about no, no, no. We actually have to talk about policy and creating a government in a society that we all want to see. I mean, that at its heart is what the Democratic Party is all about, and it's always been about. And how do we redefine by the people of the people for the people? How do we redefine that? Because apparently it feels like it needs to be redefined. Well, I think we're seeing it. I don't know that it's anything that's gonna be top down necessarily, certainly from our national party. We're seeing it organically in civic participation and people exercising their free speech and getting involved. And so what we've tried to do, and what the national party has tried to do, and this is translated to our local party as well, is provide a space for people to come together to organize, to build capacity, so that we are able to discuss these ideas, take back political power, and start to repair some of the damage that's already been done so far in this administration. One of the things I remember when we went from George W. Bush to Obama, there was a huge, I think, breath of fresh air by a number of people, our foreign allies came together again and were like, okay, great, we can all come and we can work together again. Because there was a sense of, okay, well, what was happening was not entirely what everyone agreed with. Okay, let's get back to working together as allies towards the common good, or at least as much as possible in those means. And that actually played itself out a bit through at least one of Obama's speeches, and then him getting the Peace Prize, no, the Peace Prize, because of one of his speeches as well. So on the heels of that, we have what seems to be the utter deconstruction, the blatant and stated deconstruction of what our government is. And that has manifested itself globally in a way that has really created even more trouble for the United States in so many different ways that people can't even, it's hard to understand and imagine until things start to happen. So we have some rebuilding to do in that. So what are we doing through summer of resistance? What are we doing to try to reach out to people at the moment? What are some of the things that are being done? Well, before I get into the nuts and bolts of the actual program, the summer of resistance. And in our state, what's called the summer of resistance and renewal, I'd like to speak just for a moment if it's okay about what you mentioned, about this trend that we see, a growing ideological shift in many nations toward isolationism, toward a hard right brand of conservatism and sort of in a historical context, what we can do about that. I think we always have to keep our eyes on the prize. And remember that in some cases, our capuna, our neighbors, our fathers, our grandfathers and grandmothers, our great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers fought against this and prevailed, right? We have to continue to speak out against it, but as I said before, we also need to make sure that we're talking about what has happened in the past and that there's a better day coming, that we have alternatives to offer that are better alternatives. So locally, we've rebranded this resistance, the summer of resistance as a summer of resistance and renewal for that very reason, to go back to the historical role of our party as a party of ideas, to go back to, locally speaking, our historical role is a party of diversity and inclusion. The Democratic Party in Hawaii came into existence because of working people in the labor movement and outside the labor movement, of Japanese-Americans, of Chinese-Americans, of Hawaiians, of all different people coming together to say, we want a government that represents us. And so it's so important, I think, to sort of have that context before I really talk about the nuts and bolts. So before we get to the nuts and bolts, anyway, we have to take a break already. That's how quickly that goes. Thank you for joining us. This is Think Tech Hawaii's Movershakers and Reformers Politics in Hawaii series. I'm your host, Carl Campania. We've been talking about, well, we had a Trump dump and now we're talking about the summer of resistance and the summer of resistance and renewal here in the state of Hawaii. We'll see you in one minute, thanks. This is Think Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. We all play a role in keeping our community safe. Every day, we move in and out of each other's busy lives. It's easy to take for granted all the little moments that make up our every day. Some are good, others not so much. But that's life. It's when something doesn't seem quite right that it's time to pay attention. Because only you know what's not supposed to be in your every day. So protect your every day. If you see something suspicious, say something to local authorities. Welcome back to Think Tech Hawaii's Movershakers and Reformers Politics in Hawaii series. I'm your host, Carl Campania. Once again, welcome to the show, Mr. Tim Vandevere, chair, the Unitech chair of the Democratic Party of Hawaii. Once again, welcome. And we're talking about the summer of resistance. So let's get into the nuts and bolts of what we're doing. Let me start this way, though. You mentioned earlier in the previous segment that not everybody who's part of the overall resistance to Trump are members of the Democratic Party of Hawaii or Democratic Party at all. One of the things that I've heard in the conversations is the reason why many of them are not. And the reason why is a lot of them didn't feel that the party was doing enough. So that's where I think it's important that we start to make sure that all of those people out there see that the Democratic Party is not trying to co-opt the resistance, but joining. And saying we're trying to do something. So I think that will help bring more people together and help unify. And I think that's one of the things that you've been doing. I know there's a lot of different groups and factions within the party of big tent that need to come together. And I know that you're doing that. That's why I call you the unifying chair. But with that, though, so as a result, that's why I want to hear the things that the party is doing and the nuts and bolts of the resistance. So let's go from there. Okay, so just to the first part of your question, what does the party stand for? How can we be better about addressing issues that affect working people? How can we be there for organized labor and our brothers and sisters in the union movement? I think it's gonna take an ideological shift. And the party's still kind of struggling with that right now. I personally am a proponent of New Deal politics, which means a strong social safety net, a very strong and fundamental role for our government to play in the lives of people. I think that should have probably been the answer. I think it should have been the answer. It's what brought us out of the Great Depression. The 2008 financial crisis. I think in many ways that's why we saw the Occupy movement in 2011 is because people were hurting and the government wasn't doing enough and quite frankly, the Democratic Party wasn't doing enough to respond to that. I'm talking on a national level here. So that debate is still going on within the party and we're still struggling with that. Structurally, however, I think the party has started to get some things right. Myself along with many other of the newly elected state party chairs really pushed the DNC to go back to a 50 state strategy. I heard a lot of people talk about it. To a point where you had both of the candidates, the two major candidates for DNC chair, sort of falling all over themselves, trying to talk about how much they would do a 50 state or what's now called the 57 state and territory strategy. And so that part they've gotten right. And so part of what they've done, not to co-op the resistance movement, but to make the party sort of this welcoming place for people that are speaking out and speaking to our values, is to provide grants for state parties, to do things like hire field organizers, which in Hawaii is something we haven't done in decades. Okay, let's break that down a little bit. So the Democratic party created a grant program. So from their coffers of funds, what they did was they provided states. That's right. Funds, grants. That's right. So here's money to go hire some field coordinators. That's correct. For a finite amount of time, in this case through the summer, there will be more grants coming available in October for different reasons, but primarily to build the infrastructure of some of these state parties, because we know that we've been devastated in state elections. Of course, not the case necessarily in Hawaii. And that's one of the reasons why we sort of rebranded our program here to be a summer of resistance and renewal, right? Because we do have some structural issues within the party. We haven't, I think, been at a place where we're willing to have regular meetings at our districts and precinct levels and provide training in quite some time. And there was a time in our party's history where the precinct club was where the action was. That was a social club. That's where you got together. When people talk about grassroots, that's what they're talking about. That's the grassroots. And so we're really trying to kind of shift the culture back to that mentality, to provide people a forum on a monthly basis, to provide some guidelines from the state, quite frankly, for ideas, for events you can have, for forums, informational forums, to invite our legislators to be part of the district and precinct meetings and provide training for our precinct folks. Because we know from the schoolhouse to the state house to Congress, we need to be organized and looking toward 2018 and the work's got to start, it had to start yesterday. And in many ways, that's part of what the DNC has gotten right right now and we're absolutely on board. Oh, and that's a huge thing. And that's a huge thing. So that's absolutely true. The grassroots, and one of the things at the beginning of all of this, I think once we started to see the swell of resistance in the women's march and all of them really start to show and everyone started to see what we were expecting and then what we saw from the women's march on the 21st of January. My first comment was, wow. We've just awoken the sleeping giants of grassroots. All over again. Chicken skin right now. Exactly. And that in itself, I'll thank Trump for that. I'll thank him for that. There's a few things I can thank him for. It's actually thanks to him that the Affordable Care Act repeal went down. That's actually a good thing. A lot of what he does or doesn't do has those impacts. And so we can actually thank him for them and that stuff. But this is okay on it. When I say there's a better day coming, that's what I'm talking about. The feeling that I had when I was following the lead of the women in our party and the women in our community during the women's marches, and I was part of the women's marches in Hilo and Kona. I was on the big island for those days. That's what I'm talking about. That to me gives me an incredible sense of optimism of what the future can hold. Yes, and from the media, as we were saying earlier from the media to all of the resistance people, all of the separate groups working in any coordinated fashion possible, understanding that the primary goal is against Trumpism. And one of the goals with that needs to be shoehorning him out of the Republican party. Well, I think we need to be careful. I mean, I agree with that, but I think we need to be careful to not just chase the latest outrage that the president utters. I think we need to look at, and I think Senator Schatz, Senator Schatz and Hirono in particular have been very good about this in saying, what's happening with the policy? What is driving this policy? What's actually happening behind the scenes? Because while this guy's out front making the latest offensive tweet, they're trying to take our healthcare away. They're trying to dismantle the administrative state or they're waging war on our environment. And the LGBT community and through systematically taking apart one of the things I may or may not have mentioned in my opening remarks is one of the things that he did recently was, and something that just happened in the last couple of days as well, but one of the things he did recently was he defunded the mechanism and the entity that was trying to enforce anti supremacy. He defunded it. So of course, he's opening those door. And then what just happened as well, and these are all the signs of, hopefully we're at a turning point when all of his business commission have just fallen apart. They all abandon ship and then he comes out with this declaration that I've decided to shut him down to not put pressure on him. So much for running government like a business, huh? Exactly, exactly. So your businesses don't want any part of it. So, okay, I'm sorry. Let's go back into what the party is doing locally, how people can be involved, where can they go to get involved, how do they jump in? So, first thing I would recommend is getting in contact with your district officials. We're gonna be having 31 of our 51 district statewide meeting in the month of August. This is something that again, hasn't happened in a long, long time. And then hopefully monthly meetings thereafter. The September meetings- How do they get in touch with our district? You can go to our website and find out who your district chair is. Okay, which website? There's multiple websites. HawaiiDemocrats.org.org. HawaiiDemocrats.org. Find out who your district chair is. You can also call the state party. And we'll be happy to give you guidance there as well. The September meeting will be all about training. So if you're a member of a district, if you're one of our officers at the district level, officers at the precinct level, we'll be talking about your roles and responsibilities. We're gonna be doing some fundraising. We're gonna be holding informational forums. We've got a lot of stuff coming up, but I would say that's the first place to get involved. Is with your precinct or your district. Probably your district to find out when those district meetings are happening. After that, it's just a matter of staying informed and involved. One of the things we're also providing is an activist calendar, right? A way to plug into some of these resistance groups. So we've got people that want to be involved. Okay, I showed them to a meeting. Okay, what am I doing? What then, what are the actions that they can then engage in? So this weekend is the national weekend of action. So we're gonna be doing canvassing across the country and then Hawaii will be knocking on hundreds of doors the district level to improve our membership outreach. We're putting a survey in the field. We're going to be cleaning up our data, making sure that we have ways to contact and talk to our members. Really ultimately at the end of the day, Karl, what this translates into is political power. Because if we're able to call into the districts and make sure that people are engaged and informed and also talking with their representatives, then we're actually able to pass our legislative priorities through the state house and then get organized and help other states for 2018. Exactly, and create as much as possible a model for other states, for other districts. There are sister states and sister district opportunities. There's so much that's going on out there. So all right, thank you so much. I think we're at the end here. Thank you so much. I truly appreciate the opportunity to learn more about it. Next time there's an update, please come back to the show or next time there's some crazy thing we need to figure out, come back to the show, we can talk, because I would just want to make sure there's opportunity to learn about what's going on and what we can do and how we can all engage. So thank you for joining us again. This is Think Tech Hawaii, Movers, Shakers and Reformers, Politics and Hawaii Series. I'm your host, Karl Kompanya. Once again today, we had our Trump dump and we had a great conversation with the chair, the unifying chair of the Democratic Party of Hawaii, Tim Vandere. Thank you for joining us. We'll see you next week when we have Senator Stanley Chang. Do that. All right.