Hirono highlights dangers to Hawai‘i, U.S. because of mass federal firings

Mr. President, over the past 2 months, we have seen chaos unleashed across our country as Donald Trump and Elon Musk take a chainsaw to our federal government — firing thousands of federal workers en masse with no explanation; more firings to come.

I suspect by the time they are through, if they are ever through, hundreds of thousands of federal employees will be fired.

Rather than making government more efficient, these indiscriminate cuts are gutting our government from the inside out, effectively eliminating crucial programs and offices. And while Republicans shamefully paint hardworking federal workers as “faceless bureaucrats,” we know that our federal workers do important work.

From ensuring social security checks go out to providing care for veterans and so much more.

And every state has individual federal employees doing critical work, often work that goes unseen.

In Hawai‘i, for example, Fish and Wildlife Service employees are responsible for keeping invasive species out of our state. Once invasive species arrive in our islands, it is often impossible to eradicate them, that is why the work of these employees are so important

Last month, the Trump Administration fired [a] Fish and Wildlife Service employee whose job was to keep one particular invasive species — the brown tree snake — out of our state. You can see Mr. President, it is pretty ferocious.

This picture depicts a brown tree snake eating a bird whole.

Native to Australia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, the brown tree snake was accidentally introduced to Guam during World War II and has been wreaking havoc on that island ever since.

One of the most destructive invasive species in the world, the brown tree snake is responsible for the extinction of at least a dozen animal species in Guam, including many of the island’s forest-dwelling birds and native lizards.

But the snake didn’t stop at birds and lizards, it also went after Guam’s native bats, domestic poultry, even pets.

As its population grew, the brown tree snake began invading power facilities, causing short circuits and frequent power outages. To this day, brown tree snakes cause nearly 200 outages a year in Guam, costing $4.5 million each year in what they’re doing — in repairs — I mean, you can imagine what kind of havoc lost productivity by the millions.

And despite years of various attempts to control the brown tree snake, as of 2024, Guam’s population of brown tree snakes is estimated to be in the millions.

Sadly, it is highly unlikely that this invasive and destructive species will ever be fully eliminated from Guam.

Thankfully, this snake does not yet exist in Hawai‘i or anywhere in the continental U.S., but that is not by accident or chance — it is because of the tireless work of federal employees from several agencies that has kept this snake out of Hawai‘i.

Since the creation of the brown tree snake program nearly 20 years ago, not a single brown tree snake has been found in Hawai‘i because the program works. The federal investment in equipment, training and hiring personnel works.

Several agencies — including the Department of the Interior, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Defense — work together on the research, interdiction and management of the brown tree snake. But the firing of just one individual — who served as the brown tree snake program coordinator in Hawai‘i — threatens to nullify all of that successful work.

This individual was responsible for ensuring that biosecurity protocols were being followed and coordinating amongst the different agencies involved in the program. And he has been doing this for a number of years — he has the expertise to do this well — to keep this snake out of Hawai‘i.

He oversaw the implementation of the brown tree snake program for the entire Pacific region. And as I give this speech today, his position — eliminated for no good reason by Musk and Trump — his position, to this day, remains vacant.

And as we know, there is a hiring freeze imposed by the president also.

So, if he is not reinstated, the likely scenario will be that it will not be a matter of “if” brown tree snakes are introduced to Hawai‘i, but “when.” And let’s be clear, if this snake makes it to Hawai‘i, I fear it is only a matter of time before it reaches the rest of our country.

Trump and Elon Musk think they can just take a chainsaw to our federal workforce and budget, hacking away with no consequences. But in 10 years, when brown tree snakes have decimated Hawai‘i’s ecosystem, and wreaked havoc in other states across our country, it will obviously be too late. 

Mr. President, the brown tree snake is a real threat that Hawai‘i takes seriously. And in every state across our country — red and blue alike — there are federal workers doing critical, often unseen, work to protect the health, safety and well-being of our communities; critical federal employees.

Firing these employees will inevitably make our country and our communities less safe, less prosperous and more vulnerable to outside threats — from foreign governments to invasive species, and everything in between.

I stand ready to work with anyone serious about making our government more efficient, but these cuts are having the opposite effect.

I urge my Republican colleagues to join me in standing up for the critical federal programs in these states — in our states — and to the well-being of the American people by rejecting this administration’s attacks on our government, and the people who keep it working and who protect our communities.