LIHU‘E — After three days of nearly nonstop protests at their Wainiha rental property, 15 members of Love Has Won received a police escort to Lihu‘e Airport Sunday in two waves.
Members of the religious nonprofit exited a rental house in Wainiha around noon on Sunday en route to the airport with a Kaua‘i Police Department convoy, including leaders Amy “Mother God” Carlson and Jason “Father God” Castello, who were later observed arriving on Maui.
Eleven additional members were escorted by police from the Kaua‘i Inn in Niumalu to the airport, including members who were still completing their 14-day, state-mandated quarantine, at 4:41 p.m.
Applause rang out from protesters and neighbors in Wainiha and Niumalu who sat down across the street to watch as the escort drove off.
Mahealani Chandler had been out protesting since Friday on the North Shore.
“I’ve been up for three days,” Chandler said, tired. She’s part of a core group of protesters, mostly women, concerned for the safety of their ‘ohana and island community. “We remain in kapu aloha.”
Protesters have found the group’s ideology to be predatory of vulnerable populations, vulgar and offensive in its appropriation of Hawaiian culture, with the group’s leader claiming to be the Hawaiian goddess of fire, Pele.
Word spread through the coconut wireless last week and Sunday about the group, and protesters first came out in force Friday to surround the beach-front rental.
However, peaceful protests turned rowdy Friday night, with reports of a firework being shot toward the house and damage to a brand new Honda Pilot that sat in the driveway. It is unclear whether the damage to the car and residence were done by protesters or members of the group.
Mayor Derek Kawakami arrived in Wainiha Saturday evening, telling protesters the county was negotiating with Love Has Won to leave the island. Five of seven members from the rental property left later that evening.
Protesters were relieved to see the group leave Sunday afternoon when Love Has Won leaders were escorted out of the North Shore by KPD. A smaller group of protesters then quickly turned their attention to Niumalu.
For over two and a half hours, protesters stood, viligiant, outside the Kaua‘i Inn.
Around 4 p.m., one Love Has Won member changed in the parking lot from shorts to jeans behind a towel draped over an open car door. Protesters called out “indecent exposure.”
A KPD officer said, “People change on the beach all the time.”
Michael Dahilig, county managing director, stood with KPD officers, facilitating. Dahilig told protesters he was trying to make sure the group could leave the island safely.
Dahilig said he was there on a personal basis, and directed questions to county public information officers, who did not respond to requests for comment by presstime.
The brand new Honda Pilot, with a cracked front windshield and no back window, was towed away with nonessential belongings from the Kaua‘i Inn, as it was deemed too dangerous to drive.
The 11 members were said to be boarding a 6:55 p.m. flight to Honolulu Sunday, and as heard on the police scanner around 5:36 p.m., officers were ensuring members boarded the flight.
•••
Sabrina Bodon, public safety and government reporter, can be reached at 245-0441 or sbodon@thegardenisland.com.
Well done Kauai. I’d never heard of the group until I read it in this paper. After doing some research , I agree 100% with the protesters, this group BAD news. This group needs to be broken up before anyone else is hurt by them.
I Love Kauai, and to see good people stand together to keep riffraff out does my heart good when it seems like no two people can agree on anything, Kauai does
It’s funny to read all of the comments. It’s even funnier that some want to represent Kauai as a place where “the trash” gets taken out.
This is far from true. Kauai is loaded with all kinds of trash, and it has been tolerated for decades. One can only conclude that you either love your existing trash, are blind to it, or are disingenuous.
Mobs hounding peaceful people from their residence just because of their beliefs? What could be more UNAMERICAN!
So this is how freedom of religion really works on Kauai.
Yep ! @mauisurfer ! Don’t come Kaua’i if you can’t respect the people that were here 1st ! Go back Maui . Kaua’i is a special place & we gonna keep it that way at all cost !
“respect the people that were here 1st”
Spoken like a true Karen that just got out of 3rd grade.
radicals like you will be the death of Kauai. maybe you prefer to live of unemployment and trade coconuts.
What ever happened to freedom?
Just.leave people alone .
FYI
Hey where can I join this cult or.maybe start my own? We might worship the kauai chickens as our Pele.
Jesus, allah, Ganesha, all welcome here, but a haole woman declaring herself to be pele and seeking 144000 to move here is not, repeat not, going to be embraced . Whats nice is the fact that after you’ve proven yourself, this is the best community to live in anywhere. yes we are all racist, we dont see eye to eye, but we can get along, show respect and unite together irregardless to eject trash of all colors. So carbon nation and and other cults, blm and the like should think thrice, this is Kauai, not the mainland, this land was stolen. This is a , a place where Hawaiian lives matter first and until the atrocities against them are rectified expect no mercy for any mainlanders thinking they can come being disrespectful. I think you will see further unity here, and vacation rental are next. Why should any mainlander be allowed to run a commercial enterprise here on the beach, while Hawaiians living on shit land in Anahola. Read land and power in Hawaii.
This Mainlander says “amen”
This mainlander agrees…there is no place on Kauai for anyone who means harm to the land or the locals.
Agree 110%. I’m not clear on the Anahola comment. I am a mainlander who has visited Kauai 5 times. Last year we stayed in Anahola. We are very respectful to land, culture and locals. Locals were nice as always and the area was beautiful. Every town no matter where you live has a low income area – do you live in Hanalei and are comparing?
This is a cult masquerading as a “religion” to get tax breaks. One of the main leaders has stated repeatedly that they were “not a religion”. Check the comment section on TGI’s previous article, as well as the cult’s fb.
No “Love” here…..
Good riddance, but surprising how many people are willing to follow a crackpot like sheep.
Who is going to be next, in the fiefdom of Wainiha? You know, don’t you, that this slippery slope can lead from targeting a group who calls its leaders Mother and Father God to whoever is deemed “inappropriate”. Perhaps a Christian group can root out those who practice the old Hawaiian religion. Or perhaps others will object to the subversive influence of yoga or energy healing. Where does it lead when protesting civilians–who “turn rowdy”–are allowed to define a “cult” and run people off the island?
Well said!
MAIKA’I NO HEMOLE KAUA’U….I SEE SOME NEGATIVE VIBES FOR THE REMOVING OF THE CULT, CALLING THEM A RELIGION, THAT IS COMPLETE BULLSHIT!!! THIS IS COMING FROM DA HAOLES, DAT CAME AND PLANTED THEIR OKOLE IN HAWAI’I AND THEY THINK THAT THEY
LOCAL!!!! AIN’T GONNA
HAPPEN MAN!!! KAUA’I JUST PROTECTING KA AINA, NA KEIKI, KA MOKU…HIKI NO!!! HEMOLELE O KAUA’I!!!
ALOHA WAINUI ELABAN
MAUI NUI A KAMA…
Good news! Thank you to the County for negotiating this group off the island. Best case scenario, this sends a signal to some of the group’s members (victims) that something is amiss and that maybe it’s time to put down the meth, stop worshiping false idols, and begin to live an honest life.
If the woman says she’s Pele, why did they send them to Maui? Shouldn’t it have been the Big Island?
Any reason why these pictures are so tiny?
The County now negotiates for those not accused of violating any laws to leave the island? Was this more please don’t sue the County for not adequately protecting you from harassment, property damage, those violating large gathering limitations, illegal bonfires, etc.?
Welcome to the North Shore of Kauai. Please check in with Mahealani Chandler for approval of your religion and speech.
If you violate her idea of “aloha,” you will be terrorized by the North Shore Militia.
Nope. Kauai peeps jus’ out to call it as they see it. Meth dealers and human traffickers not welcome here.
Meth dealers and human trafficers should be dealt with by authorized law enforcement, not vigilante terrorists.
Response to one of their live streams. * She never got attacked physically. It ended when you all left Kauai. Mom is an animal abusing alcoholic. You whack jobs have a lot of nerve to call us evil. Your evil nature brought this on yourselves. You people cheated the property owner by putting more people in the house than was legal. Mom the foul mouthed hag deserved every bit of the harassment she received. Kauai cleans herself of trash like you. You would never have been safe on Kauai. You’re all lucky the police escorted you to the airport. Count your own blessings. We don’t need yours. You have no clue about Kauai or its people. You arrogant fools reaped the karma you sewed. You people know nothing about integrity. You cheated the home owner by putting more people in the house than agreed upon. You’re all out of the house now. You have been to the airport. You will not be welcome anywhere in Hawaii. Mom is not Pele. Pure? What do you idiots know about being pure. You already backed down. Mom has cancer from alcohol and the rot inside her is a manifestation of her soul and her ascension is nothing more than a dying hag clinging to a sick power trip and still trying to lead her sheep to the slaughter. Your time has run out. You people are egocentric cult followers. We need to find balance? And a state of compassion? Take your love down the road. You are pillars of light? You idiots. You inspire hate because your karma sucks it all to you. It’s simple. Your empty words are nothing more than verbal diarrhea. You arrogant neurotic followers think you’re some sort of saviors? You’re a brown stain on what’s good and pure. Mom is over. Then who will you follow. We live in harmony here. A strong community of generations living in harmony. We came together to push the evil personified by you fools out and off Kauai. Kauai has won. LoveHasWon has lost. LoveHasWon is lost. You people talk like you know something others don’t. You all swear. You all follow a cancer stricken alcoholic foul mouther sorry excuse for a human being. You preach nothing. Empty words. You think you’re something special? How arrogant. We on Kauai didn’t rest until every last one of you left our sacred island. Your karma caught up to you all and you came to the best place on earth to find out where you all stood in the scheme of things. You think Mom is God. The foul mouthed alcoholic who threatens to kill people. Drunk God. You all are lost lambs that follow evil. You spew cliches that mean nothing. You mention how destruction follows you. Gee I wonder why? You accuse the community of being evil of the way we ran you off. You say if everything you put out creates your reality then your inner reality is black and evil. You brought this on by your past actions. I’ve lived here many years and there has never been anything like this. Tell that to Mom and digest it. This was not a mob. This was a strong community coming together to rid itself of people that do not have the decent inner soul it takes to last here. And you all lasted a very very short time. Unprecedented cleansing. The swear words were all we needed to know you were all wrong on every level. God doesn’t swear. God does not threaten to kill people. God does not drunkenly abuse animals. You come here and judge us like you are the chosen few? Like you understand us? What arrogance. Go away and rot….
Thank you Auntie Louise Sausen and Miss Molly M for the truly heroic effort of making sure that airport delivery truly did happen. Without you and your comrades the mission would have stayed in the lua.
“Protesters have found the group’s ideology to be predatory of vulnerable populations, vulgar and offensive in its appropriation of Hawaiian culture, with the group’s leader claiming to be the Hawaiian goddess of fire, Pele.”
maybe it’s time to educate these terrorists (protestors) that we all enjoy freedom of speech and religion.
SO WHAT if some kook calls herself Pele; do we really think Pele will be harmed? oh wait, Pele is mythical…
Correctomundo!!!!! unruly protestors = terrorists! Book’em Dano!
This group was not a religion as the leaders themselves claimed. They are a danger to themselves and society. There are many reports of this group swindling others. Their “Mother god” appears to be high in their videos. They even crowdfunded a “road trip” to Disney because “Mother” could not fly in a plane due to fragile health. Yet she flew to Hawaii.
Well DAMN! Paradise lost. Not in the fact that “Love has One” has been ejected off the island, but in the fact this has happened (to quote TGI):
However, peaceful protests turned rowdy Friday night, with reports of a firework being shot toward the house and damage to a brand new Honda Pilot that sat in the driveway.
Has Antifa and the Marxist BLM movement infected our normally peaceful protestors on our island? Sure looks like it. Please KPD, squelch this behavior before it adopted as commonplace. The sooner the better, or you’ll have the current Mainland behavior happening every time someone gets their nickers in a twist.
GOOD RIDDANCE, mahalo to all the protesters. So fortunate there are wise folks protecting the Island. Religious cults are responsible for many of the Covid-19 out breaks around the world. In Korea, one cult was the source of 66% of all cases at one point. Do not let them get a foothold on the Island, remove them quickly, cults spread like a virus, fast and deadly sucking up all the stupid people [not a bad thing], zero respect for locals.
No comments yet. I am shocked. On the norm, it goes off up in here.
Well I’ll go first.
I say Aloha which also means GOODBYE to the cult, and it’s crazy practices. I think all the Northshore can rest easy. We can all get a good nights sleep.
What laws did these crackpots break? Is there a law against being a crackpot? If there is, the people that targeted this particular group of crackpots has more work to do.
There has been a dangerous precedence set here. Any one of you reading this could be targeted next.
There are laws against crack, however. Pretty sure there are laws against trafficking humans. These folks also broke quarantine and posted video belittling authority while two of their leaders flipped the bird. Sure sounds like they respect and “love” others.
where can I find more information on Joining this group? I am a lost sole.
Hawaii Revised Statutes > Chapter 707 > 707-715
Hawaii Revised Statutes 707-715 – Terroristic threatening, defined
Current as of: 2019 | Check for updates | Other versions
707-715 Terroristic threatening, defined. A person commits the offense of terroristic threatening if the person threatens, by word or conduct, to cause bodily injury to another person or serious damage or harm to property, including the pets or livestock, of another or to commit a felony:
Terms Used In Hawaii Revised Statutes 707-715
Felony: A crime carrying a penalty of more than a year in prison.
(1) With the intent to terrorize, or in reckless disregard of the risk of terrorizing, another person; or
(2) With intent to cause, or in reckless disregard of the risk of causing evacuation of a building, place of assembly, or facility of public transportation.
Tell that to the victims of Jonestown, or Manson. They started out just like this, preying on weak minded people and eventually forcing them into submission. No one cares if the occasional odd-ball group of “Wiccan” or similar benign groups want to practice in private. But if you take a look at what was being spouted by this particular cult leader, you’ll see why there were people willing to give up a week of their lives in protest.
Well thank heavens that’s over- as soon as she claimed to be Pele… I knew it was the End. But if so, she should go jump in Kilauea and return to save us all! Aloha, burn bright!
Good riddance and great job by the mayor. At the same time I feel sorry for the followers, obviously lost and mentally ill souls that the leech leaders of the cult are corrupting. Wish they could throw them in jail.
Love has not won, love was lost.
Whatever happened to the loving and accepting aloha spirit? What happened to freedom of religion?
This is unacceptable.. I have personally put my money where my mouth is, and I just hired a lawfirm and put down a 10 million dollar retainer, to investigate the mayor, the county, and if warranted file suite in federal court for intentionally harassing this group, and violating theIt civil rights.
Hahahahaha. Funniest comment award goes to you. Are you sure you don’t mean “suit”?
Look what Christianity has done to the culture here. Double standards and vigilante justice, sounds like trump’s America to me and a lot less like the founding father’s idea of what this great country should be. Shame on you.
RE: Hate Has Won
“Please check in with Mahealani Chandler for approval of your religion and speech. If you violate her idea of “aloha,” you will be terrorized by the North Shore Militia.”
You might consider educating yourself. This group is NOT religious, they do NOT believe in religion, in fact they laugh hysterically at it. In one of their YouTube videos they suggest that anyone who has a book of religion (bible) should use the pages for toilet paper, that those words are from someone’s ego thousands of years ago, thus irrelevant in the here and now. Amy > Mother of the Universe, Madam Pele, Trumps daughter, former fast food Manager that’s a washed up psychotic drunk is the one to worship now.
I’ve watched, and read enough to know that ALL Kaua’i residents should be GRATEFUL for the protesters who managed, in just a few days, to chase these people off the Island before they proliferated, and dug their heels in!
MAHALO to all the protesters, and our Mayor for his voice of reason on Saturday!
@LTEreader
Thanks for your voice of reason. Please, please be very careful here. By listening to their stuff as you research, you are being exposed to evil, which could manifest in your life. Evil sprits can affect people unbeknownst to them; how do you think their followers are so blind to their evil deeds and seem brainwashed? So please beware, anyone who looks this cult up.
And yet we have obvious meth houses with out a word from anyone. Let’s surround a few of those houses and send those folks packing to the airport with the support of da mayor and KPD.
I think we can all agree this cult is out to pray in the weak and venerable using the internet and Kauai to increase cash flow. I don’t care where you live would you want this happening in your home town? Take some time and watch Mother Smurf God’s drunken rants. It reminds me of Charles Manson. Would you want your Daughter or son to get drawn in to this cult or any cult for that matter? I sure wouldn’t, it sad to see these young people participating in the scan. I hope the FBI takes them all down very soon. It’s coming Mother Smurf, Cirrhosis of the liver!
Evil has left the building. And Kauai. So sorry for the families of the victims- the sons, daughters, the once normal moms or dads who left everything behind to join this group. I looked this group up and there are many people hoping their loved ones will return, all saying they were brainwashed, they turned into different people, they even left their children behind. They watched the livestreams or had “cleansing” phone calls. Only one thing can explain this. They are working with evil spirits. Sounds weird, but it’s a real thing. (Shudder.)
These “protesters” sound as whacky as the cultists, proving once again we’re all brothers and sisters.
Oh cripes. All these ‘gods’ and ‘goddesses’ are just imaginary anyway. Not just Pele, all of them. Yes, that includes Jahweh, Allah, and Jesus (as a supernatural being, not a historical human). They’re all cults. A ‘religion’ is just a cult that’s managed to accumulate money and power, and been around awhile. As for ‘cultural appropriation’, that is nonsense. All cultures exchange and incorporate ideas and practices from others. There is no such thing as a pure culture — that’s a fascist idea.
As i black man i consider Hawaiians to be in the same battles as other People of color and whats beautiful is they still have their culture intact. I’m always curious all of these negative comments are from what appear to be Caucasians. Are you saying they don’t have a right to protect whats left of their culture? on their LAND? Yet in Texas, Montana,etc they refuse federal rulings and suggestions ALL THE TIME often to the detriment of everyone. It really seems like the frustration comes from not being able to BUY a passage and actually having to respect and assimilate into a culture that is NOT your own.
If you are going to kick cults guilty of religious appropriation off the Island, you need to get rid of the Mormons too. You can add racism to their cultish teachings.
The Mormons taught that native Hawaiians are descendants from of the house of Israel who sailed from Jerusalem to South America and then sailed to the islands. They also taught that God turned the skin of Hawaiians dark because they were wicked while their more righteous relatives skin remained “white and delightsome”. It was taught that Hawaiians skin will become white again when they embrace the Mormon teachings. They have started to back off and even deny some of these racist teachings but it is a major them from The Book of Mormon.
People educate yourselves and have a close look at the Love Has Won website, videos and facebook. See what it is the leader speaks about and how she treats her pets then make up your mind whether freedom of speech and the legality of running them off the island. Do you want them in your backyard? Do you want that foul language of the leader ranting and raving and calling her followers whores because they can’t get tequila to her quick enough in your ear or your child’s ear? Do you agree that they should have nonprofit status and not pay taxes as you do? Then decide whether Kauains were right in protesting against the group’s rights of saying or living wherever they want. {in which case they were in violation of the number of bodies in a vacation rental of that size} After all they think Robin Williams in his role in Mork and Mindy is somewhat of a mascot and will ascend with them. Their disrespect of Hawaiian culture within days of being on the island shows her intent of disrespecting all Kauaians. Just watch the videos before you negate the protestors who took time out of their lives and their family’s lives to state their feelings. It is not the North Shore trying to keep fair-minded people out.