John Carroll, an 88-year-old perennial Republican candidate who’s been running a gubernatorial campaign centered on removing a major trade barrier and building the agriculture industry, veered in two very different directions Tuesday in a livestreamed interview with Civil Beat.

Carroll proposed eliminating Hawaii’s general excise tax, the state’s largest single revenue source which accounted for 44 percent of Hawaii’s tax collections in 2017, and to hold a popular vote to decide whether to restore Hawaii to a sovereign monarchy.

He articulated those ideas as seemingly offhand remarks near the end of an hour-long chat with Chad Blair, Civil Beat’s politics and opinion editor, as part of the “Know Your Candidates” series. And he provided scant details on how to resolve the complex issues both actions would raise.

Anthony Quintano/Civil Beat

Hawaii has been illegally occupied by the U.S. military for generations, and the kingdom is still recognized under international law, Carroll said, echoing arguments made by some legal scholars. Whether to remain part of the U.S. or assert sovereignty, Carroll said, should be put up to a vote of the people of Hawaii: current residents born in the state and residents who can trace their ancestry to the Great Mahele, a massive land redistribution in the mid-1800s.

“By international law the kingdom still exists,” he said. “The question is, ‘What can you do about it?’”