Back to Hawaii News index

Posted: Friday, March 3rd, 2006 5:18 AM HST

Hawaii Democrats to pay back questionable campaign money

By Associated Press

HONOLULU (AP) _ The Hawaii Democratic Party will reverse a series of transactions that channeled five-thousand dollars to a Rhode Island candidate for the U-S Senate. State Democratic Party Chairman Brickwood Galuteria said today that the party made a mistake when it got involved in the Rhode Island race. Hawaii Republican Party Chairman Sam Aiona says he believes the transaction reported by The Associated Press yesterday was illegal. The Hawaii Democratic Party gave the five-thousand-dollar donation to Rhode Island Secretary of State Matt Brown. He's running for the Democratic nomination to the Senate on a clean-government platform. A few weeks later, in January, a mainland donor made a six-thousand-dollar contribution to the Hawaii Democratic Party. The party disputes that there was a deal in place to support Brown in exchange for the unidentified mainland donor's contribution. (Copyright 2006 Associated Press. All rights reserved.)