Mayoral rivals turn to Mainland mud-slinging

By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer

Honolulu mayoral candidates Duke Bainum and Mufi Hannemann have turned to negative ads in an attempt to gain an edge in what has so far amounted to a lackluster race.

Hannemann	Bainum

Campaigns use such tactics to chip away at their opponent's support base and sway undecided voters in close races, but attacks can backfire — especially in Hawai'i — if they're seen as gratuitous and unfair, experts say.

"Hawai'i's people want you to play fair," said Dan Boylan, a political commentator and history professor at the University of Hawai'i-West O'ahu. "They don't like negative advertising. They don't like the idea of talking stink."

Mudslinging, a tactic more commonly used on the Mainland, can shortchange voters by failing to address important issues the winner will face in office.

"I think what's going on nationally is really nightmarish, and I do think more and more we do see it in Hawai'i," said Tom Coffman, author of several books on Isle politics. "It usually is some kind of manipulation of the truth, and I think it's very destructive to the democratic process."

Bainum is blasting Hannemann in mailers that detail illegal donations to Hannemann's campaign committee and showcase news reports about other illicit donations.

And Hannemann is running at least one television ad that accuses Bainum of spending money on wasteful projects while he served on the City Council, saying he would be no different as mayor.

Both attacks oversimplify important details.

The Bainum mailers lump together illegal donations that Hannemann's campaign committee received years ago, with court cases he had nothing to do with, and link them to unproven theories that contracts for city projects have been awarded in exchange for campaign donations to others.

And the Hannemann ad suggests that Bainum spent money on a stand-alone basis, when his involvement was limited to voting on budgets that often included hundreds of items, most of them proposed by the city administration.

Boylan said the race is getting nasty probably because there's limited public interest in it and the candidates aren't far apart on most issues. Against the background of Mayor Jeremy Harris being criticized sharply for city spending on park and beautification projects, both candidates stress that they intend to refocus city spending on basic services and infrastructure, for instance.

"The mayor's race is dull — let's face it," Boylan said. "How can you get people excited about potholes and sewers?"

Both candidates also have sponsored ads that cast them in a positive light. Bainum says he will free City Hall decisions from the influence of special interests. Hannemann says he will aggressively audit city finances and has the leadership skills to bring people together.

The two split early in the race over taxes on agricultural property. A dispute over condominium leasehold conversions has become another wedge issue. Bainum called for tuning up a 2002 law that changed the tax structure for farmland, while Hannemann wants to throw it out. Hannemann favors repealing a law that allows the city to force landowners to sell qualified condominium owners the fee interest in the land under their units. Bainum supports the law.

But those issues aren't glamorous, and they concern a limited number of potential voters. Attack ads can be used to create doubt among an opponent's supporters and win converts in an effort to nudge stagnant poll numbers, Boylan said.

"Negative advertising usually comes out of some sense of desperation: There's no movement, nothing much is happening, so you go negative," he said.

Bainum campaign spokeswoman Phyllis Kihara defended the mailers that attack Hannemann.

"I don't consider those negative, because they're factual information," she said. "The fact is that he took $61,000 in illegal contributions and he claims to not have known." That raises questions about how accountable Hannemann would be to the public as mayor, she said.

But Hannemann campaign spokeswoman Elisa Yadao says the mailers are misleading.

"The whole thing is kind of constructed to make people come to the wrong conclusions about what both Mufi and his campaign have done relative to campaign spending and contributions," she said. "We've always cooperated (with investigators), and there's no evidence that Mufi has done anything that's out of line in soliciting campaign contributions."

Yadao defended the television ad attacking Bainum, however, saying it raises legitimate questions.

"Those are very public advertisements," she said. "They're commercials. They're on television. They're not mailed to selective people. We're not targeting a specific demographic. And it is a discussion of Mr. Bainum's record, which ultimately is how we hope people will judge the two candidates."

Bainum's campaign said the ad was misleading because it oversimplifies the city budget process and ignores votes Hannemann made on the council that favored projects similar to those criticized in the ad.

Negative campaigning is common on the Mainland because it can be very effective, said Jim Ross, a San Francisco political consultant.

"You can win campaigns with it," he said. "The problem is, when you go negative, not only does it raise the negative perception of your opponent, it also raises your own negative perception, to a lesser degree. You have to walk kind of a fine line."

Candidates who believe they have a substantial base of committed supporters will often risk the fallout of attacking an opponent whose base is thought to be less firm, he said.

Campaigns can be especially mean-spirited in some southern states, but some Mainland communities are also very sensitive to such tactics, Ross said. "You have to be careful on how you play things, in terms of the cultural context," he said.

Ultimately, a winning campaign must give voters good reasons to support a candidate, no matter how they are made to feel about an opponent, Ross said.

Coffman said Hawai'i historically has resisted a negative approach to campaigning more than other places largely because people here are familiar with each other.

"It was a small enough island community where maybe not everybody knew everybody, but many, many people knew one another and were acquainted," he said. "Attacks on character or performance, the red flag would go up if it weren't true."

The state's population has changed considerably in recent decades, though, and much of that familiarity is gone, Coffman said.

"Huge circles of people or geographic areas and neighborhoods have no idea what's going on elsewhere," he said. "I think the ties that bind are really weakening here. My own feeling is that the more we become like the rest of the country, the more acceptable negative campaigning is going to be."

Reach Johnny Brannon at jbrannon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8070.

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'Bainum, like Harris, wastes money' Candidate: Mufi Hannemann Media: 30-second TV spot. Summary of ad: Duke Bainum spent money on wasteful city projects such as large signs announcing the names of various neighborhoods, roadway median landscaping, the Waikiki-Kapahulu trolley, and the Bus Rapid Transit project. Bainum represents politics as usual, not the changes he promises. Bainum is shown beside Mayor Jeremy Harris, suggesting they are political allies who share similar values. Reality: Bainum was one of nine City Council members who cast votes on city budgets that included various items, but they did not directly spend the money. Hannemann voted for some similar projects while on the council but opposed Bus Rapid Transit. Bainum says he supported BRT because it was the only mass transit option Harris' administration presented to the council. Bainum and Harris were photographed years ago at ceremonial events that don't indicate political allegiance.		'Hannemann, like Harris, takes money' Candidate: Duke Bainum Media: Brochures mailed to voters. Summary of brochures: Mufi Hannemann's campaign committee received more than $61,000 in illegal donations from nine donors. This is part of a larger scandal in which illegal donations have been made in exchange for contracts related to city construction projects. This cycle of corruption must end. Reality: Hannemann's campaign forfeited the money to the state Campaign Spending Commission when informed the donors had exceeded legal contribution limits or illegally gave money to others to donate between 1996 and 2002. Neither Hannemann nor his campaign has been charged with wrongdoing, but have been credited with cooperating in the commission's probe. Investigators have long suspected a link between city contracts and illegal donations to Mayor Jeremy Harris, but none has been proven in court.