08/11/23 08/11/23 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> what is going on this devastating. this is trauma on top of 100 plus years of colonial trauma that created a condition that is a type of tragedy to happen. we have so much loss of our ecosystem that created this condition that put us in this predicament.

amy: the death toll from the devastating fires on the hawaiian island of maui has reached 55 and is expected to rise. the historic town of lahaina has been largely destroyed in what is now being described as the largest natural disaster in hawaii's history. we will speak to two native hawaiian activists in maui about the fires, the legacy of colonialism, and the climate crisis. >> the fire is a symbol of the terminal point, where it all end s up if you continue down this mode of extraction as a way to live. but it is also -- it contains the most deep and durable relic of our history. amy: we will also speak to a fire scientist at the university of hawaii about how the climate emergency fuels the deadly fires. all that and more, coming up.

welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. in hawaii, the death toll from the historic maui wildfires has reached at least 55 people and decimated the town of lahaina, once the epicenter of the kingdom of hawaii. one of the more than 1700 structures that were destroyed is the na 'aikane o maui cultural center. earlier today, hawaii governor josh green described the sheer scale of the disaster. >> if what was so was likely the largest natural disaster in hawaii state history. we are seeing loss of life here. as you know, the number has been rising and we will continue to see loss of life. we also see many hundreds of homes destroyed, and that is going to take a great deal of time to recover from. that is why we come together. we talked to an old gentleman who had not seen anything like

this ever come a wildfire that took a whole city. his neighbors have all lost their homes, his home was intact and this was a gentleman and tears who does not cry easily. amy: some residents questioned why hawaii's emergency warning system didn't go off as blazes raged closer and closer to their homes. president biden has declared a major disaster as the hawaiian tragedy has shone a spotlight on the urgency of the unfolding climate catastrophe, as well as the ongoing exploitation and occupation of the islands by the u.s. after headlines, we'll spend the hour on the maui wildfires. tensions are running high in west africa after the regional bloc ecowas ordered the activation of a standby force for possible intervention in niger in response to the july 26 military coup. this is nigerian president bola tinubu speaking from yesterday's emergency ecowas summit in abuja. >> as you will see from the

summit, there's no option taken off the table, including the use of force as a last resort. we remain steadfast in our commitment to supporting nigeria in a journey towards peaceful and democratic stability. amy: the associated press reports he nigerian military coup leaders threatened to kill deposed president mohamed bazoum if any military action was attempted to restore his rule. meanwhile, the intercept is reporting the u.s. has trained at least five members of the new ruling junta in niger. the u.s. has since paused security assistance to niger's military. african officers trained by the u.s. military have now taken part in 11 coups in west africa

since 2008, including in burkina faso and mali. in ecuador, one suspect is dead and six others have been arrested in connection with the assassination of ecuadorian presidential candidate fernando villavicencio. officials said all suspects in custody are colombian and alleged members of a drug trafficking group. ecuador is now under a nationwide state of emergency while authorities continue to search for the possible mastermind behind villavicencio's assassination. this is ecuadorian defense minister luis lara. >> the armed forces have begun the immediate employment of their troops throughout the national territories, that there will be an armed forces presence in every city and town. they will remain there until the conclusion of the electoral process. citizens have been guaranteed the armed forces will provide the necessary security for the polls. the vote of ecuadorians will be the best response to the mafias

and their allies. amy: villavicencio's murder has thrown ecuador into further disarray after current president guillermo lasso in may dissolved the opposition-led national assembly, blocking efforts by lawmakers to impeach him over accusations of corruption and embezzlement. meanwhile, ecuador's snap elections are still scheduled for next sunday, august 20, though several presidential and other candidates have suspended their campaigns. in burma, at least 23 rohingya refugees are dead after their boat sank as they attempted to reach malaysia. over two dozen others are still missing. thousands of rohingya muslims have taken on the perilous trek to malaysia or indonesia after filleting genocide and persecution in burma. five u.s. citizens imprisoned in iran have been transferred to house arrest in what is reportedly a first step towards being released, in exchange for iranian prisoners in the u.s. and for tehran gaining access to $6 billion in frozen oil revenue to go towards humanitarian

needs. the dual citizen prisoners were jailed in iran on unsubstantiated spying charges. the move comes after over two years of negotiations according to "the new york times." this is secretary of state antony blinken speaking thursday. >> so this is a positive step, but i don't want to get ahead of the conclusion because there is more work to be done to bring them home. my belief is this is the beginning of the end of their nightmare and the nightmare their families have have experienced. amy: blinken said any exchange will not include sanctions relief for iran. the u.s. supreme court has temporarily blocked a sweeping settlement deal for oxycontin maker purdue pharma, that would shield the sackler family from civil lawsuits, in exchange for paying out $6 billion to thousands of plaintiffs, including state and local governments, that have been devastated by the opioid epidemic. the justice department challenged the settlement, which extends bankruptcy protections against liability for sackler

family members in what the u.s. solicitor general called an abuse of the bankruptcy system. opioid overdoses have killed over half a million people in the united states over the past 20 years according to the cdc, including prescription and illicit drugs. the louisiana pardon board has begun scheduling clemency hearings for the state's death row prisoners one day after governor john bel edwards ordered the move. this comes after the board last month refused to set hearings for 56 death row prisoners who filed a mass petition to commute their sentences before the democratic governor edwards leaves office next year. he opposes the death penalty. in a fort pierce, florida, court, donald trump and his aide and co-defendant walt nauta pleaded not guilty thursday to three additional charges in the case around trump's mishandling of classified documents. trump did not appear at the courthouse in person. the charges came as part of an updated indictment accusing trump and two aides of trying to

delete security footage at his mar-a-lago estate. in other trump news, federal prosecutors proposed a start date of january 2, 2024 for the trial related to trump's bid to overturn the 2020 elections. mexican officials are demanding texas remove its border buoys from the rio grande, saying the floating barrier, aimed at blocking asylum seekers from reaching the united states, was installed on mexico's side of the river. between the buoys there are circular saw blades. dozens of asylum seekers, including children, have been severely injured. last week, the bodies of two asylum seekers were found in the rio grande, one of them trapped in the buoy barrier. mexico's foreign secretary alicia bárcena spoke thursday after meeting with u.s. secretary of state antony blinken in d.c. >> on the buoy issue in texas, we are deeply concerned about the issue by thankful because the u.s. justice department has filed a lawsuit against the texas government and this helps is very much because we are

talking about a delicate situation on our borders, in our rivers, the rio grande. most of the buoys are on the mexican side. amy: democrats have renewed their calls for supreme court justice clarence thomas to resign following yet another bombshell report from propublica detailing even more lavish gifts and trips from right-wing billionaires. california congressmember ted lieu said thomas had "brought shame upon himself and the united states supreme court. no government official, elected or unelected, could ethically or legally accept gifts of that scale. he should resign immediately." and jess search, award-winning producer and co-founder of doc society, has died at the age of 54 after a battle with brain cancer. the visionary filmmaker was a champion of documentary film, which she believed had the power to change the world, often

telling others -- "if you are going to move people to act, first you have to move them." during her 18 years at doc society, formerly britdoc, the organization supported such films as laura poitras' oscar-winning "citizenfour" about nsa whistleblower edward snowden. more recently, jess search was an executive producer on the acclaimed "while we watched" by director vinay shukla about journalism in prime minister narendra modi's india. oscar-winning filmmaker lucy walker was one of many who paid tribute to jess search, saying -- "she championed so many underdogs - because she loved them. she knew their potential because she'd once been the underdog." jess search is survived by her wife filmmaker beadie finzi and their two children. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman.

we turn now to the hawaiian island of maui, where devastating hurricane-fueled wildfires have killed at 55 -- at least 55 people. the catastrophic fire destroyed the historic town of lahaina and left thousands of people homeless in what is being described as worst natural disaster in hawaii's history. on thursday, president biden issued a major disaster declaration for the state freeing up federal funds. cnn reports the fire in maui is now the second deadliest blaze in the united states in a century, trailing only the 2018 camp fire in california, which killed 85 people. and the death toll in maui is expected to rise as search crews reach areas destroyed by the fast-moving fires. hospitals are overwhelmed with burn patients. power and cell service remains out for much of the area. authorities say the fire destroyed all of the buildings in the historic section of lahaina, which once served as the capital of the hawaiian kingdom. hawaii's governor josh green says it looks like a bomb went

off in the town. later in the show, we will speak to two native hawaiian activists in maui. but we begin with a horrifying account from one man from fresno , california, named vixay who survived the fire in lahaina by racing into the ocean with his wife and five children. the family was visiting lahaina when they got trapped by the fire. >> we tried to get out. i family and i, just black smoke above us. traffic was stopped. we were by the seawall. we got ready to go would we saw the flames -- when we saw the flames. we add to get out. we left our vehicle. i wife and our five kids, we all got in the ocean. we found a floating oar we hung

onto. we were floating. everything was burning. cars blowing up. we could not breathe. just carbon monoxide. we held on as best we could, my wife and my kids. the older ones helped with the younger ones. the waves try to take us out to the ocean. there were really great people with us. we were out for three hours. we hung on to the seawall as best we could. [indiscernible] there was fire all around us. i was trying to cover them and help as best i could. about 9:30 p.m., the fire came

to rescue us. we walked to the quarters they made. everything was burning. everything was destroyed. we were at shelter for that night. my adrenaline was rushing. i had to calm down. i worked in the er for 15 years. my kids are amazing. my daughter was asking, are you ok, daddy? they are tired and exhausted. the ocean almost swept my kids away a few times. we stuck together. we held on. we are not going to die.

we are here, we are alive. amy: he survived the fire by racing to the ocean with his wife and five children. when we come back, we will speak to two native hawaiian activists in maui about the catastrophic fires. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. we continue to look at the catastrophic wildfires in maui. we turn now to kaniela ing, who is the national director of the green new deal network. he is a seventh-generation native hawaiian from maui. i spoke to him on thursday night, asking him to talk about what has happened in maui and the historical significance of lahaina. >> thank you for having me. i will preface by saying i have been really busy but when i'm not doing interviews, i tend to break down. these are really somber times.

i was born and raised in malley. i am native hawaiian. seven generation. our island is on fire. our most historic town was set ablaze by wildfires. hundreds have been evacuated, hospitalized. the death toll is climbing a people are searching for loved ones right now. donald trump, ron desantis, tim scott, joe manchin, oil companies come anyone in power who denies climate change to me are the arsonists here and we are living the climate emergency. it is sad times right now. it is heartening to see the community come together, deliver goods to families in need. fundraising has been incredible for the direct relief. but what i am wondering personally is once the recovery efforts start to unfold and cameras are gone, who is going to be left more powerful or less

powerful? are people still going to be paying attention when the recovery work is going to last for years? is that going to make community stronger or make the people who have mismanaged the water and created the conditions for these fires to happen even more powerful? that is what we are focused on right now. amy: can you talk about specifically the friends, the family, what has happened to those that have been devastated by the fires, particularly in lahaina? can you tell us some of those escape stories? some of what has taken place with the fires suddenly wiping out this historic city? and then talk about the store nature of lahaina as the capital of the hawaiian kingdom and what that means. >> we are a tropical island here

in maui. we are not supposed to have wildfires. this came as a shock to everyone. there are not enough firefighters here. we cannot ship them over from the next state, we are an island. everyone right now is feeling a bit overwhelmed. as it occurred, we saw community members jumping into the ocean with nowhere else to go, just floating and watching their homes being reduced to ashes. the death toll went from six to 36 all of the sudden and there are still firefighters, red cross members out there searching for loved ones. it was -- it was apocalyptic. something you would only see in a movie. but the reality is, this is becoming quite the norm and he will become more so in the

future. lahaina town is often characterized as a tourist town but the people who live there, which should be the focus, tend to be somewhat rooted native hawaiian i've ever met. their families from generations ago created aquaculture, which the west is only learned about now. i used to work with them to figure out better ways that no aa could manage fisheries. they are the keepers of the ancestral knowledge. some of -- most of the folks evacuated our immigrant folks. my heart goes out to those families. amy: when you say it is a tourist town, that is because it is historic.

talk about what that means. give us a history lesson about hawaii and about maui and how it relates to the mainland united states, even how it became a part of the united states. >> sure. lahaina town was a thriving center of hawaii, the heart of hawaii before not just statehood but before hawaii was even a territory of the united states. so we start from one end and walked to the other, it is like a disneyland ride to the colonial timeline of capitalism in hawaii starting from royalty, sandalwood, sugar, pineapple, tourism, to luxury. to me, the fire is a tragic symbol of this trajectory terminal point. where it all ends up if you continue down this mode of extraction as a way to live. but it is also -- it contains the most deep and durable relics

of our history of resistance, museums and architecture, infrastructure, the banyan tree -- the oldest and largest in the united states, which has burned. 150 years old. but also just the fact of how slow it was to develop is a testament to the people power, usually native land resistance. amy: you refer to the raging wildfires as a result of colonial greed. explain. >> yeah, so there are two facets. first, climate change. the national weather service says that because of this was a downed power line and the spread of because of hurricane force winds and the spread was low humidity and winds. it is not political. it is a matter of fact.

climate pollution, corporate polluters that sent a blanket of pollution into the air that is overheating our air caused the conditions that led to this fire. in addition, there is mismanagement of land. those original big five oligarchy in hawaii, missionary families that took over economy and government, they continue on today as some of our largest political donors and landowners and operations. -- corporations. they are diverting water away for very long time, for generations. lahaina was actually a wetland. you could have circulating the church back in the day. because they needed water for the corporate ventures like golf courses and hotels, that has ended. the natural form of lahaina would never have caught on fire. these disasters are anything but

natural. colonial greed and the fact they cause the pollution that warmed our planet and sent hurricanes like this to become the norm and the gross mismanagement of our land and water, which degree new deal actually is about returning both mitigating climate change but also returning the stewardship of land and water to the people. amy: can you talk about the dry land right now? i mean, you have hurricane dora hundreds of miles away, the wind was intense but the drought that existed -- that relationship to climate change? >> yes, that's right. growing up on this island, with saw maybe one or two fires and they were very contained when things got to the drought factor. never has been anything close to

this. even the climate scientists i've worked with over the years were shocked by this fire. a lot of it had to do with the dry conditions. growing up, my dad would point to the sugarcane and say, when you are my age, all of this sugarcane will be gone. i was like, ok, sure. it is such a central part of maui. but he was right. the sugar is gone. the reason why is one of these big five oligarchal corporations i spoke of new the sugar was not profitable but they continued mono cropping most of the island in order to get some tax breaks for agriculture. now, i grew up in a community where rain rained to nash on us.

there were people who fought against the cane brain and the corporation ended up blaming the activists for the sugar shutting down, pitting the workers against the community. the result now is like a foul, dry land across the whole central valley of our island. really, community members were to unite, organized years ago, we could have had a much different future. that is still something that i think we should continue working to build, is labor and environmental -- amy: you talk about the april survey of homeless people, unhoused people, think something like 704, among them 244 suffering from and to help disabilities. the unhoused crisis among native

hawaiians and what do you know about native hawaiians who were unhoused and how the wildfires have affected them? >> i think there's a certain perception of native hawaiians who are unsheltered that does not fit with reality. some of the unsheltered hawaiian community set continue today were occupations of land that was getting seized. there were like, we don't want to cooperate with this new extractive economy that you all created so we're going to live by ourselves in our own community, the beach, govern ourselves. they are quite organized and living in a way that is subsisted in harmony with nature. it is not to be glamorized. a lot face really dire condition stopping a part of this

capitalist system, but all of them are doing it based on really strong and sensible beliefs. now, when a climate crisis hits, when a disaster hits, it is going to impact these people worse no doubt. we need to make sure relief and recovery efforts in the longer-term are prioritizing the low income and indigenous people that -- some are still unaccounted for. some don't have ids. they need to be front of mine with everything we do from day zero when disaster breaks two years out with recovery. amy: the wildfires occurred on the same day that president biden said in an interview that he had practically declared a climate emergency, but he has not formally done that. what would that mean?

>> yeah, i just think practically, try to make sure our loved ones are ok but i also work -- this is my job. as soon as i start thinking about that statement from president biden, i just get so incensed. this is a climate emergency. there is no practical, practically declared it. you either believe it or not. that and republicans have been denying climate, democrats are just hopeful by not doing enough -- are just as culpable not doing enough. scientist that we need to be investing at least one choice in dollars a year and the clean energy transition stuff we need to end and phase out, deny all

new fossil fuel permits. and really empower the community's that bill back ourselves democratically. that is the solution for it. president biden announced his second term but he had not told us how he was going to finish the job. he needs to lay out the vision that we have been demanding from a green new deal if he wants communities to come out. the base of voters that happen to be predominantly black and indigenous and low income people, we need something forward-looking to come out because right now, like, i'm not even thinking about voting. nobody in lahaina is thinking about supporting biden. give us something. at least let us be seen. i think that sense of urgency, even me who is in climate work full-time and see these events

unfold elsewhere, and till it hits you at home and it is people you know, grocery stores you shop at, schools your kids go to, or church being burned down, you're not going to understand the urgency. it is shocking. we're not talking 10 years from now, things are happening right now. it could happen to your home tomorrow. that is the urgency we are dealing with. we need to act accordingly. there is no "practically" speaking. we need to move now to do every thing we can. amy: can you tell us more about the importance of indigenous wisdom and practices in addressing the climate catastrophe? >> sure. going to lahaina, the people that lived there for generations are the keepers of some of the most profound indigenous knowledge that i have ever met. the understand subsistence

fishery, how native plants were buffers against disasters, how to create agricultural practices. it is that view of the world where our success isn't determined by how much were worth, but how much we produce and share in our economy is not based on how well the rich are doing but how many people, how many of us can actually thrive. it is not just indigenous knowledge, but the value system that really needs to be reestablished. i think over the years, especially in my line of work, there has been more resources for indigenous folks to lead frontline fights against bad projects. at the intervention that needs

to happen is indigenous leaders also need to be resourced. they need to be the purveyors and architects of the new grain and community rooted world that is still possible, even in these dire times. amy: finally, would you like to leave us with some images that you have been living through over these last few days? like the banyan tree where you show us -- when you put out on social media the before and after the wildfires. but other images or stories of people's bravery in trying to preserve what you have known for so long? >> as we are speaking, there are people that still have not found their loved ones. i have a friend i grew up with

from a lower income neighborhood, they are firefighters. i ran into one on the way here. i was like, hey, you're doing a great job. he was sweating and just started crying. looked like he had not slept in days. multiple businesses are letting people drop off goods and their shipping three to four times a day, leaving their doors open 24 hours. there is the sense of this is an island, we are all in this together. mutual aid and solidarity is carrying us through. it has been quite remarkable to witness, but i don't want to leave you with positivity, either. these are hard times. unless we take urgent action now, it will only get worse. amy: what do you feel is the most important thing that president biden, the federal

government, people should be pushing for right now? >> right now we need direct aid but there needs to be a longer focus on recovery, rebuild the community -- we can't rebuild the community and if weeks, it will take years. we need to do it intentionally, not just bringing us back to the status quo because the status quo is what led us here. make sure we have more democratic and community control institutions that come out of this. unfortunately, the groups that are best poised to deploy direct aid because of their institutional connections are also the most likely to enable disaster capitalists from exploiting the situation. so we need to create -- we need to understand as we are having people wanting to help, they are

using sources that have and i toward community organizations, to organizers who will be there once the cameras leave and rebuilding from the ground up over the course of the long run. amy: one more time, can you tell us why the banyan tree is so important? >> yeah. the banyan tree is so iconic. there's like 16 trunks. it is the largest in the united states. it just turned 150 years old in april. the images of it being completely toasted is heartbreaking. i have hope because trees have deep roots, especially of that age, that it will continue on. that is the vision in my mind. as we build as a community, as we realize the vision of a green new deal nationally and globally, the banyan tree also

re-grows its leaves and is a positive symbol of what is to come. amy: kaniela ing, national director of the green new deal, seven generation hawaiian. i think my little pup for staying quiet during that interview, which makes me think about all of the fawna and flora destroyed as well on maui and of course, most important, the people. coming up, we speak to native hawaiian activist and fire scientist at the university of hawaii. back in 20 seconds. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: "sugarman" by rodriguez. sixto rodriguez, the subject of the 2012 oscar-winning documentary "searching for sugar man," passed away this week at the age of 81 in his home in detroit. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. as we get an update now on the impacts of the wildfire on lahaina, the area in west maui that is of historical importance to indigenous people. entire neighborhoods were wiped out by the wildfire, including the na 'aikane o maui cultural center which had a massive archive that was lost to the

flames. the head of the center said, "the place is burnt down to the ground." we are joined now on maui by noelani ahia, a kanaka maoli activist and a longtime organizer in lahaina. she is also the co-founder of the organization mauna medic healers hui and has been involved in mutual aid efforts as the community responds to the devastation. welcome to democracy now! it is an honor to have you with us. can you describe from your vantage point where you are especially the cultural center is the center of lahaina in terms of what has been lost at the center and overall in the town. >> thank you so much, an. na 'aikane o maui cultural center was founded about 20 years ago and historic lahaina town and happens to sit adjacent to very

sacred area of maui. it is a traditional place where we would call a sacred place dating back to the 1500s where one of our former kings who presided over the islands lived and his sacred family was birthed there and we have stories that carry us down today that connect us back to that place, that reroot us. this island was in the middle of a wetland. it was lush and beautiful and green. because of settler colonialism and because of the impositions of the settler government, it was covered over a long time ago and there are baseball fields on it now and tennis courts. the na 'aikane o maui cultural center has been working to get access in order to restore it

and make sure it is a place of reference again. the folks have been working for decades on all kinds of issues, protecting land right issues and just generally being there for the community to provide classes and workshops and cultural practice and cultural protocol. in the building also house a collection of artifacts as well as historical documents, old maps, just priceless things that are lost in the blink of an eye. it was burned to the ground and all of the things were lost. there was also a collection from esteemed german whose collection was being housed there. for this elder, this was his life's work. he's 85 now and this was 50 years worth of carvings that he himself did of collecting items from all over the south pacific

when he traveled in a canoe voyaging project back in the 80's. i had the burden, you could say, after telling him yesterday that his collection was gone. it was devastating. it was devastating. this man's life work. he created all of these things not for himself but for future generations to understand how brilliant our people are and how ingenious we were. so much of that history and that culture was lost to us after the overthrow, with the new government in the way the people that came in and took over lands, particularly where talking about the plantations and the oligarchy that kaniela ing was talking about.

so many were dispossessed from their land and we lost so much of our culture, including our language. when an elder like this dedicates his life to retrieving and retracing and remembering those pieces of ourselves that allowed us to live here on this isolated island, how to make tools, how to make rope, how to make the instruments that feed us -- all of these things that allowed us to have life and survive here, all of those things that he dedicated his life to are now the memory. but i will say, he told me yesterday morning that he woke up having a dream. he said he saw as planting seeds back in the ash. he saw as putting back our traditional plants, traditional

medicine. he saw as putting those things back in the ground so new life can come again. for somebody of age who is closer to moving into the next realm that many of us, for him to still be thinking about the next generation and still be thinking about what the future could be in lahaina, for me is the measure of what it means to be indigenous and what it means to be genealogically connected. amy: noelani ahia, it is so painful to talk to you right now at this moment with the destruction that your island has undergone. if you could talk about the mutual aid efforts -- first of all, in the rest of the corporate media, we hear almost no native voices, no native

hawaiians. and why it is so important to hear your voices. and then what is happening on the ground? there's a big debate now like, why weren't people alerted earlier? where was the early alert system? why were people just looking out the window or smelling the smoke and signify right in front of them? and how important that is. it also, just described lahaina as a tourism destination. if you could speak about that as well? >> thank you so much. it is very disturbing for us to see the headlines and talk about see lahaina as this tourist count as if that is all that is. for us, it is so much more. the tourism as part of the commodification of our culture, it is part of the erasure of our

culture, that narrative literally takes is out of the picture. without hawaiians, there would be no hawaii. everybody loves a loja but they forget about the people a that breatheloha into the world. the over tourism come the overdevelopment, the dispossession of kanaka maoli from our land, the mono cropping as kaniela ing was talking about, those are things that contributed to the conditions that created this. as we live on the island, there's only so much space and so much room and only so much resources. for over 130 years, our water has been diverted to go to the sugar plantations and pineapple fields. what used to be a lush lahaina -- i will tell you a little something. lahaina is not an older name.

there is an older name that means land of the fine breadfruit. lahaina used to be covered in breadfruit, which is a staple for the hawaiian diet. it is incredibly nutritious. it is being studied the world over to help with food poverty and underprivileged areas. it is an amazing, rich, historical plant press. lahaina was covered with it until the sugar plantations came in and chop it all down. they permanently changed our ecosystem. on top of the diversion of water , what is happening now that plantations have shut down is unscrupulous developers are diverting the water and inking it for. distant real estate for the local people, it is for foreign investors. it is for gentlemen estates that

have large swimming pools. really inappropriate use of -- most sacred resources. the name for water in hawaii -- which means if you have water, have life. are what has been taken away from us and left us in this dry, barren, almost unrecognizable -- it would unrecognizable to our ancestors, this condition we are currently living under, the settler government. you combine the dispossession with the over tourism, with overdevelopment and yet this trifecta for disaster. that is what we're seeing today, absolute disaster. it is absolute devastation. amy: we only have a minute and then we're going to go to a fire scientist at the university of

hawaii, but the mutual aid efforts on the ground. there are grassroots efforts saving everyone. >> thank you. they a group in maui, we are working with them. we have medics, food distribution. we are working on organizing housing for people. but one of the issues we are having is we are being prevented access, and it is really disappointing because the people on the ground know what the community needs. the people on the ground self organize and are able to move fast, quickly, and get the needs of the people where they need to go. but unfortunately, i have to say, there has been some blocking of those efforts. it is always done under the guise of safety. when our people are suffering because they don't have any food and they don't have any water and we are not allowed to get them resources, it is really,

really challenging. we are finding some unique ways to get resources to people. folks have been taking boats around from the other side of the island in order to get resources in. we have been using whatever methods we can to get the needs of the people met. it is a beautiful effort. the people on the ground are so strong and so resilient and so ready to jump in to help one another. we say "love going out and love coming back." one of my good friend said today your disaster kit must include community. amy: noelani ahia, thank you for being with us, and all the very best. kanaka maoli activist and a longtime organizer in lahaina. this is democracy now! i'm amy goodman. we go now to looking at how the deadly wildfires that spread through maui came weeks after

worsening drought conditions. the u.s. drought monitor reports nearly 16% of maui facing severe drought and 20% is facing moderate drought. we are joined in honolulu by clay trauernicht, professor in the department of natural resources and environmental management at the university of hawaii at manoa. where he focuses on improving wildland fire management in hawaii and the pacific. it is great to have you with us. put these two issues together. you have the hurricane hundreds of miles away, creates hurricane winds that fuel these wildfires, and how this is connected to climate change. >> thank you for having me. i would like to say how much i appreciate you highlighting the voices of your prior guests to kind of round out the

perspective on this incident. in terms of the climate or the weather events we have seen, we had the combination of the storm passing through the south, this high-pressure system that really ramped up winds and lowered relative humidity over the course of a couple of days. what is really important to understand is that those really rapid changes in weather can have huge effects on fire danger. but the reason they're having the affects they are is because of the landscape changes that your prior guests were mentioning, the change in the vegetation surrounding the community in lahaina as well as country maui that is experiencing similar fires and still outpost of these changes have affected most of the island. change and land use the past

couple of decades, decline in agricultural production has really resulted in the dramatic expansion of these non-native tropical grasses. this creates this vulnerability we are seeing right now, the explosive growth in fire that we saw over the past couple of days. amy: were you surprised by the scale of this disaster? and now this debate of where were the early warning -- so many debts and probably a number more -- how it could have been dealt with in a different way? yet the governor saying this is the worst natural disaster in hawaii's history. >> i think we are clearly grappling with the human toll. this is something that is absolutely unprecedented. just the loss and hearing the stories of your prior guests, af us just how dramatic this is and

what the impact this has had on the people. first and foremost. as far as the unprecedented nature of these fires, unfortunately, something we have been seeing over the past decade at least. we can look back to 2019 where 21 homes were lost in west maui due to similar fires. the same year we had about 20,000 acres burned through central maui. 2018, we had a near pass of a hurricane, large-scale fires on a wahoo -- oahu. each of these incidents, we are seeing the firefighters who have on the ground, those are the resources we have. they were spread incredibly in this past week. they're doing everything they can. as far as what we can do and by we i mean the response agencies

we work with, nonprofits, wildfire management -- i have to give them credit, too. we're trying to get the word out and identify the actions that communities and land managers can seek prior to these fires so we can reduce risk, create safer conditions, sort of relieve the burden -- which at this point really falls onto our emergency responders. another element or dimension to this change in land use or limited management we see on these tropical grasslands that cover the state, about one million acres, is as those operations have kind of removed from the landscape, you lose a lot of the knowledge that was there from the workers who knew where the roads were, or maintaining the roads, maintaining water access. all of this burden falls on our firefighters. we are asking them to do really heavy lifting. up until this incident, we also have to say they have done a

commendable job of really protecting our communities. as you said, this is the worst we have ever seen. all of the fires we have seen the past couple decades since agriculture has been declining, typically our firefighters are successful at protecting homes, infrastructure, and human lives. amy: professor, president biden has pledged disaster relief and immediate assistance to those affected, but what would it mean if he outright declared not just a state emergency in hawaii, a national climate emergency? i national state of emergency? >> it is a difficult question. the struggle here, having long-term funding in place. part of that is the relationship with the federal government. again, i can only speak to the far realm, fire management realm, that we don't have these large tracts of federal land. that is usually the mechanism

through which national forests, bureau of land management, these are the mechanisms at least in the continental u.s. that funding kinda comes in for this kind of work stuff we are talking about more disasters like this to prevent the next one is to support these efforts on the ground that are actually altering the conditions of those fuels. there are lots of examples, lots of people working on this ranging from working with ranchers to do do targeted grazing, philbrick networks to give firefighters a fighting chance, re-implementing traditional agriculture. there are examples of folks restoring wetland to act as land breaks. i think our job, what we have been working on, the folks doing fire prevention work for a number of years now, how do we scale this up? that is what we need to be thinking about with assistance from the federal government, how

we can implement these actions and the knowledge that people already have, how can we do that at larger scales, coordinate across, bigger spaces -- amy: professor, we thank you so much for being with us, from the university of hawaii in honolulu.