Hawaii COVID Schemers ‘Caught Inside’
by Andrew Walden
When Hawaii politicians and lobbyists star in a movie about their own doings, what else could the title be but, “Caught Inside?”
Lt Governor Sylvia Luke says that as House Finance Chair, running for LG, she took $10,000 from Tobi Solidum, etal. If she is telling the truth, a $35,000 bribe recipient is still out there unidentified.
Did then-Rep Ryan Yamane, who quit as Director of DHS today with zero notice, after being interviewed by investigtors from the State Attorney General's office, take a bribe from Solidum? If so, it doesn’t make sense that he would get $35K. As chair of the House Health and Human Services committee during COVID, he should have gotten $10K at best, just like Luke.
HNN reports today:
“…it was his time as chair of the House Health Committee during COVID that has him wrapped up in the bribery investigation. “It became one of the most important committees because they were managing the legislation and the projects around protecting folks during COVID. All of the testing sites were being set up. They were beginning to roll out the vaccines. They had tremendous power,” Moore said.
The $35K bribe was allegedly delivered by Solidum in January, 2022—months after the ‘Caught Inside’ COVID scheme was up and running.
That means the $35K bribe recipient remains unidentified—and may be part of a different scheme hatched long after this COVID testing operation was spinning money.
In order of appearance, ‘Caught Inside’ stars:
- Mike Victorino, Maui Mayor
- Kirk Caldwell, Honolulu Mayor
- Eddie Ontai, CEO Data House
- Major Gen Kenneth Hara, Adjutant General, State of Hawaii
- Tobi Solidum National Kidney Foundation of Hawaii Consortium Developer (Luke donor, fled to Philippines)
- Glen Hayashida, CEO National Kidney Foundation of Hawaii
- Derek Kawakami, Kauai Mayor
- John D’Orazio, CEO Capture Diagnostics
Yamane and Luke don’t show up.
Caught Inside outlines key transactions making the scheme possible:
Tobi Solidum 9:30: “The mayor was really keen on, um, having the mobile lab at the airport. Can we put our mobile lab there? And it was an emphatic, ‘No!’ So the call went out to Major General Hara, who was deemed as the incident commander for COVID, all things COVID, for the State of Hawaii.”
Maj Gen Hara: “They came in and said, Hey, we are thinking that the Honolulu International Airport is the best location. When they offered this up. I said, it's a great for both screening and diagnostic testing and that the Honolulu International Airport would be the perfect place. I believe there are some challenges on placing it there. So I called Governor Ige and he said, yes. And that day we got the approval to place it at the airport.”
Tobi Solidum: “We had no contract, we had no funding. This is all being done by private enterprise. Um, through the consortium that the National Kidney Foundation of Hawaii put together, which was key to this whole project….”
But they DID get contracts—with a grossly overpriced cost per test, thanks to Mayor Kirk Caldwell. And thanks to Governor Ige, they got a grip on COVID testing at all Hawaii airports.
The first mobile lab was installed at Honolulu International Airport, November 5, 2020 as reported in the Star-Advertiser: New mobile COVID-19 testing lab launches at the Daniel K. Inouye International Airport.
Caught Inside makes this seem like a huge breakthrough, even claiming that the schemers “create(d) an innovative COVID-19 testing program that became a model for the world.”
In reality they were behind the curve.
By the time the Kidney Consortium got moving, the earliest Hawaii Longs/CVS COVID testing sites had been open for two months. Akamai viewers may notice Kauai Mayor Derek Kawakami at 16:00 touting his decision to work with independently owned Lihue Pharmacy. Independent pharmacists didn’t already have COVID testing systems being rolled out to them from corporate HQ.
Then there is the cost.
August 19, 2022, HNN reported: “Nonprofit’s non-bid COVID contract was a lucrative ‘sweetheart deal’ that gouged taxpayers:”
Copies of contracts and change-orders obtained by Hawaii News Now under the state’s Open Records Law show that the city paid a steep price — approximately $120 per test.
Ge Bai, a Johns Hopkins University accounting professor and an expert in healthcare pricing, estimated that it costs testing companies about $20 per test.
“That is an outrageous amount. At the beginning of the pandemic, the Medicare program determined that it’s gonna pay $51.33 for each test and that is already a very generous payment,” said Bai.
Bai is the co-author of studies investigating the high cost of COVID testing in Hawaii and concluded that the testing companies profited from the pandemic.
One report — published in the Wall Street Journal — looked at data from the Hawaii Tax Department and showed that between May 2020 and December 2020 revenues at the local testing companies grew at a compound rate of about 8% a month….
Testing expert Dr. Scott Miscovich said the Kidney Foundation’s comparisons are skewed. He said local testing labs had to invest heavily to provide and expand their labs for mass COVID testing.
City contract records show that the Kidney Foundation and its partners didn’t have much set up and lab costs because the city paid more than $11 million of those start-up costs.
Miscovich called it a sweetheart deal and added the federal government should audit the Kidney Foundation’s contract.
“The biggest travesty of this is that massive profits went out the door to political insiders and people who had no business taking the state’s money or the federal government’s money,” said Miscovich.
Miscovich is referring to the Kidney Foundation’s politically-connected subcontractors.
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HNN May 19 2026: Prominent Hawaii department director steps down amid ongoing bribery probe, sources confirm | Hawaii News Now
CB Feb 12 2026: Luke Donor And Friends Cashed In On City-Funded Covid Testing Program - Honolulu Civil Beat
April, 2026: Sylvia Luke took a $10K bribe—the $35K bribe-taker is still out there