U.S. Senator Daniel Kahikina Akaka is America’s first Senator of Native Hawaiian ancestry, and the only Chinese American member of the United States Senate.
Like many of his generation, Senator Akaka’s youth was interrupted by World War II. Upon graduation from high school, he served as a civilian worker then in active duty in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from 1943 to 1947.
Following the war, Senator Akaka returned to school enrolling in the University of Hawaii. A strong believer in the power of education, he made it his career, as a teacher and principal in the State of Hawaii Department of Education.
First elected to the U.S. House in 1976, Congressman Akaka was appointed to the Senate when Senator Spark Matsunaga passed away, subsequently winning election to the office in 1990, and re-election in 1994, 2000, and 2006.
Senator Akaka is the Chairman of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, the Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness and Management, the Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks Historic Preservation and Recreation, and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Federal Government Management, the Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia.
Senator Akaka also serves on the Indian Affairs and Banking Committees and chairs the Congressional Task Force on Native Hawaiian Issues.
Raised in a deeply religious family, Senator Akaka is a member of the historic Kawaiaha`o Church where he served as choir director for 17 years. He and his wife Millie are the parents of four sons and a daughter who have blessed them with 14 grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
