Welcome back to Resist with Joy. This week, we tried something a little different.
Instead of our weekly “top of the mind news”, Tina Marie, Martina, and I sat down on a Sunday afternoon for a strategy session — the first of what might become a recurring format as we head into primary season. No guests, no agenda handed down from above. Just three members of the Kona Indivisible leadership team are thinking out loud about how we’re going to show up for our community between now and August.
And honestly? I think you might see more behind-the-scenes content like this.
If you haven’t heard yet: there’s a 250th Birthday Meet & Greet the candidates happening at Makaeo Pavilion (Old Airport) in Kailua-Kona on Saturday, July 12th, co-hosted by the Democratic Party of Hawaiʻi County and Kona Indivisible. We invited every Democratic-registered candidate running for county and state office — over 40 people total — and candidates from State House, State Senate, County Council, and even the Lieutenant Governor’s race are confirmed to attend.
This event didn’t happen by accident. It happened because Gary “Bear” Usinger, our regional chair for House Districts 6, 7, and 8, started showing up to Kona Indivisible protests. That’s it. That’s how it started. He showed up, conversations happened, and three planning meetings later, we have an event.
That’s the power of showing up.
A lot of this came together because Tina Marie occupies a rare position: she’s simultaneously the assistant secretary and island representative for the Hawaiʻi Democratic Party State Central Committee and a core member of Kona Indivisible leadership. That dual role turns out to be enormously useful because the party and Indivisible operate under very different rules.
The Democratic Party, for instance, cannot endorse candidates in a primary when multiple Democrats are running against each other. Kona Indivisible can. We’re autonomous. We’re not bound by party bylaws. And that means we can do something the party simply isn’t positioned to do — publicly say which candidates we believe in, and why.
That’s not a small thing.
We spent some time on this, and I think it’s worth spelling out clearly:
The primary is where you decide who goes on the November ballot. Not November. Now. If five Democrats are running for a seat, the primary narrows that to one. If you wait until November and then say “I don’t like either candidate,” that’s because you weren’t in the room in August when it mattered.
Progressive change (the kind we’re all working toward) happens here. In the August primary. Show up.
(And yes, all three of us admitted on mic that we didn’t fully understand this until relatively recently. Tina Marie credits Bernie’s 2016 campaign. I put in the work the last few years to learn everything. None of us were born knowing this stuff. That’s why we make the podcast.)
We pulled the candidate list directly from the Hawaiʻi Elections Office website after the filing deadline passed. We cross-referenced it against the Democratic Party’s internal database to verify who is actually registered with the party. Only verified Democratic registrants got an invite.
Why does that matter? Because Hawaiʻi is a blue state, and some people register as Democrats strategically — not because they share Democratic values, but because they know a D behind their name helps them win. We heard examples: a county council candidate whose campaign website links primarily to Republican sources, a mayoral candidate who has described himself as “conservative” while appearing in the Democratic database. This is real, and it’s something voters deserve to know about.
Nonpartisan races (like County Council and the Mayor’s office) add another layer; front-facing, there’s no party label. But the candidates themselves still have party affiliations. We’re inviting those who are genuinely registered Democrats.
We’re developing an endorsement questionnaire — modeled on the criteria the Indivisible Hawaiʻi Statewide Network used for their CD1 and Lieutenant Governor endorsements (Jarrett Keohokalole and Della Au Belatti, respectively) — but expanded to reflect our local concerns.
Some of the questions we’re thinking about:
Do you understand the urgency? Can you name what’s happening at the federal level for what it is — and do you feel moved to act?
Where do you get your news? We want candidates who are engaging with independent media, with historians like Heather Cox Richardson and Timothy Snyder, with their own constituents on the ground. Fox News is a disqualifier. We said it.
Can you define liberal democracy? Not as a partisan talking point — as a form of government. Can you distinguish it from socialism, from fascism, from authoritarianism? Because the current administration is blurring those lines on purpose, and we need lawmakers who can push back clearly.
Will you ban AI data centers from coming to Hawaiʻi Island? Our island is vast, our resources are finite, our electricity is already the most expensive in the country. If other states push these facilities out, we could become a target. County Council candidates, especially, this is in your lane.
What’s your stance on state autonomy? Are you willing to push back against the federal administration when it harms our people? Are you paying attention to what other states are doing to build coalitions and protect their residents?
Where do you stand on ICE? What is your position on local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration authorities? This isn’t hypothetical — it’s happening here, now, on our island.
🏳️🌈 The pledge — and what it revealed
We touched on something that’s still unresolved at the state party level. The Women’s Caucus and Stonewall Caucus developed a pledge for party chair candidates to sign, reaffirming their commitment to protecting the rights of women and the LGBTQIA+ community. The current chair declined to sign it, citing concerns about trans inclusion in women’s sports.
He was later photographed at the Oahu Pride Parade — holding the very corner of the flag.
Trans community members who have given years of their lives to the Democratic Party came up to Tina Marie after the state convention, feeling lost. Unsure where they fit. Some are leaving the party altogether.
We’re not going to let that be the end of the conversation. Tina Marie sent the chair a direct email outlining these concerns, including forwarding a viciously transphobic response we received from a Democratic-registered mayoral candidate on Maui, and requesting the chair take action. As of recording, no response.
We’re watching. We’ll report back.
If you’re coming to the Old Airport event, find us. Martina: German accent, can’t miss her. Tina Marie: still blue hair. Me: I’ll be the one with the clipboard trying to look like I know what I’m doing.
We want to hear from you. We want to hear from the candidates. And we want to keep building a Kona Indivisible community that reflects the full, beautiful, diverse, principled people of this island.
💬 Before You Go | Take our Visionaire Questionnaire.
Here at Resist with Joy, we take the future very seriously. So our research department spent their entire lives developing a highly sophisticated, scientifically calibrated system for understanding someone's vision for our world ahead. After multiple peer reviews, revisions, and at least one whiteboard diagram that made us feel incredibly intelligent, we've discovered the perfect formula: a simple 5-question survey. We want to hear what concerns you, what gives you hope, and what joy looks like for you right now. Take the Visionaire Questionnaire here.
Resist with Joy is a podcast about civic education, grassroots organizing, and joyful resistance. Real voices, including engaged citizens, experts, and politicians, to help build the wall against authoritarianism, one joyful action at a time.
New episodes drop weekly. Interviews with neighbors doing the work are coming very soon. Subscribe, share, and if this episode moved you, leave us a review.
Subscribe | Like | Share | Click all the buttons (Tina Marie’s words, not mine)
Aloha. 🤙
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.