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Campaign Spending Commission, upon receipt of Mr. Frankel's complaint,
<br />examined what had transpired, acknowledged that they had indeed told Mr.
<br />Arakaki's campaign that they could not raise any funds, and as such, that was
<br />incorrect information. Now when Mr. Arakaki's campaign was told they
<br />couldn't raise funds through the campaign, a legal defense fund was
<br />established. Mr. Arakaki's name is on the —his social security number is on
<br />that account, because that's where the money would go to. It's important to
<br />note that Mr. Arakaki's campaign basically filed reports indicating that they
<br />have these legal expenses as a result of the effort to disqualify his campaign.
<br />Now his opponent, Mr. Fulks, never filed any campaign spending report.
<br />Now, myself as attorney for Mr. Arakaki in that dispute, I am required by law
<br />to charge the campaign for my time. I can donate up to $2,000 of in kind
<br />services to the campaign, which I did. I donated my two thousand campaign
<br />services. Now Mr. Fulks was represented by an attorney, in this case it was the
<br />complainant against Mr. Arakaki in this case. Mr. Fulks filed no campaign
<br />spending report, there's been no listing of any in kind contribution by Mr.
<br />Frankel or any other attorney, so Mr. Arakaki abided by the rules and incurred
<br />those legal expenses in order for him to run for office. The Campaign
<br />Spending Commission acknowledged that that is a legal expense. Now, the
<br />problem is, because he has term limits, he can no longer run for the Hawaii
<br />County Council, and as such, Mr. Watada, as Executive Director, advised Mr.
<br />Oshiro, who is also present here today, that they could not raise any more
<br />money. That was incorrect. If they had been told they could raise monies, the
<br />monies would not have been made to the legal defense fund, and as such there
<br />would be no issue today. But Mr. Arakaki felt that since these contributors
<br />were not going to be listed on the campaign spending disclosure, that he
<br />believed the public had a right to know who was contributing money to pay off
<br />this legal debt, these debts, incurred for the campaign. So he insisted, because
<br />of his reputation and office, that all those contributors be listed on the ethics
<br />disclosure, gifts disclosure sheet, which he did. He expended no monies,
<br />because he felt the public should have a right to know who contributed money
<br />to this legal defense fund, which was for the purpose of paying off his legal
<br />expenses. Now, when Mr. Frankel raised this issue, the Campaign Spending
<br />Commission and staff and Mr. Watada recognized that they had given some
<br />incorrect information. They looked at the law and they advised the campaign
<br />that the —that indeed, they could raise money. The only caveat is, those
<br />monies raised needed to comply with the campaign spending limits at the time
<br />of the election, and any money raised during this subsequent election period
<br />would count towards any future political race should Mr. Arakaki choose to
<br />run for another office. So that is the caveat. Based on that new information,
<br />the campaign committee decided that they would file an amended report and
<br />that all the monies in the legal defense fund would be returned to the
<br />contributors, and they would be advised that there was —that they would be
<br />able to contribute money directly to the campaign committee for the purpose
<br />for which the campaign committee was utilized, which was paying off the prior
<br />campaign debt. So, I think if anything, Mr. Arakaki's actions were exemplary.
<br />Now in terms of the specifics of the complaint, really what it comes right down
<br />to is, did he solicit funds, was it tied to any action on the Council. Campaign
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