Hawaii Lt. Gov. Sylvia Luke’s campaign should be referred for potential criminal prosecution for 251 alleged violations of state campaign finance law and pay a $28,300 fine, according to a May 21 civil complaint from the Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission.

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Hawaii Lt. Gov. Sylvia Luke’s campaign should be referred for potential criminal prosecution for 251 alleged violations of state campaign finance law and pay a $28,300 fine, according to a May 21 civil complaint from the Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission.

Luke’s campaign allegedly did not report $52,657 in expenditures and $2,464 in contributions that were documented in the campaign’s accounting records. Luke, who abandoned her campaign for reelection amid an ongoing state criminal investigation, has said the errors were her responsibility.

Commission staff investigated Luke’s campaign spending for the reporting period of July 1, 2021, to Dec. 31, 2022. Her campaign has since filed 55 amendments to disclosures during that time frame.

Commission Executive Director Kristin E. Izumi-Nitao filed the civil complaint against Luke, the Friends of Sylvia Luke, and campaign staff who worked as Luke’s treasurers. Treasurers named in the 39-page civil complaint are Luke’s husband Michael Luke, Emmanuel Zibakalam, Leodoloff R. Asuncion Jr., Kalowena Komeiji and Matthew W. Sasaki.

Attorneys for Luke, her campaign, and the campaign’s treasurers did not immediately reply to Honolulu Star-Advertiser requests for comment

Luke announced April. 23 that she was taking an indefinite, unpaid leave of absence after receiving a state Attorney General’s office letter informing her that she was a target of a separate bribery investigation. She also ended her reelection campaign.

Asuncion Jr., former chair of the state Public Utilities Commission, and lobbyist Tobi J. Solidum also received target letters from the AG in that public corruption probe.

The campaign spending complaint alleges eight counts of filing false reports with the commission and four counts of unauthorized handling of campaign funds.

The commission will meet at 10 a.m. Wednesday to hear the complaint and consider further action. The complaint alleges that Luke and her campaign’s staff “recklessly, knowingly, or intentionally committed a violation of law” and calls on the commission to refer the complaint to the Attorney General for “further investigation and potential prosecution.”

Investigators also asked commissioners to make a preliminary determination that there is probable cause to believe that the Hawaii campaign finance law has been violated and assess $28,300 in fines.

Luke’s campaign allegedly committed 243 violations, each punishable by a $100 fine and eight violations each punishable by a $500 fine.

Izumi-Nitao declined comment Thursday.

Most of the alleged violations in the civil complaint were previously disclosed by Luke’s campaign. Luke hired Nevada-based Common Cents Consulting to audit her filed data with the Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission from 2022 to 2025.

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Among the alleged violations for unauthorized handling of campaign funds are monies handled by Zibakalam and Michael Luke because neither was ever officially named as the treasurer. The alleged unreported expenditures include reimbursements paid to Sylvia and Michael Luke and others who paid for campaign services and then were reimbursed.

Luke’s attorney, former state Attorney General David Louie, in a June 19 letter to the commission, referenced the ongoing state criminal investigation and requested “an indefinite stay or continuance.”

“Because an ongoing criminal investigation is being conducted by the Special Investigation and Prosecution Division of the Department of the Attorney General of the State of Hawaii into Respondents Sylvia Luke and Leodoloff Asuncion, Jr., neither is able to testify or otherwise respond to the allegations set forth in the Complaint,” Louie wrote. “Precedent from the Hawaii Supreme Court and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals makes clear that the right against self-incrimination requires that any civil action be postponed until after resolution of any criminal proceeding involving the same conduct.”

The Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission’s investigation is independent of the state Attorney General’s investigation.

“The Department of the Attorney General does not have any additional information to provide related to the ongoing public corruption investigation,” department officials said in a statement Thursday to the Star-Advertiser.

The ongoing state investigation includes more than two dozen interviews and reviews of thousands of pages of documents, including emails and text messages.

On Jan. 16, the U.S. Department of Justice gave Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez “evidence concerning an alleged incident involving an unnamed ‘influential state legislator’ ” who allegedly took $35,000 in campaign contributions.

Four days later, Lopez announced an investigation into an “influential state legislator,” who allegedly agreed to accept $35,000 in campaign contributions at a 2022 dinner.

The dinner occurred on Jan. 20, 2022, and allegedly included Luke, ex-state Rep. Ty J. K. Cullen, Solidum and Solidum’s stepdaughter Kristen Pae.

Luke’s attorney, Louie, told Lopez that Luke and her campaign retained him as their attorney on Feb. 5, four days before Luke told the Star-­Advertiser and other media that she may be the “influential state legislator” recorded by the FBI allegedly discussing $35,000 in campaign contributions.

The evidence driving the state AG’s investigation came from the long-running federal probe that included evidence gathered from the 2022 dinner, which was recorded by Cullen who was working as an FBI informant.

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