De MONT Kalai Manaole v. Office of Hawaiian Affairs, et al.

Petitioner is a Native Hawaiian trust beneficiary under the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920, as amended (“HHCA”). Respondents are the State of Hawaii and its agencies — the stewards of a federal trust that seven decisions of the Hawai‘i Supreme Court, from 1982 to 2024, have confirmed to be in continuous, unredressed breach. The Petition presents the following five questions: I. Whether the two-year statute of limitations for 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claims bars an action by federally-protected trust beneficiaries alleging an ongoing, continuing breach of federally-imposed trust obligations, where discrete acts of breach — a 2023 commercial desalination contract and the 2025 commencement of construction on ceded trust lands — occurred within the limitations period, in light of National Railroad Passenser Corp, v. Morgan. 536 U.S. 101 (2002); and whether a state limitations period may be applied at all to extinguish the explicit, mandatory, and continuing trust duties Congress imposed in the HHCA and section 5(f) of the Admission Act. II. Whether the State of Hawaii’s transfer and commercial exploitation of ceded lands held in trust under section 5(f) of the Hawaii Admission Act — without consultation with, or benefit to, Native Hawaiian beneficiaries — constitutes a breach of the Admission Act compact for which federal courts may fashion relief. III. Whether a federal district court may extinguish claims against a named, properly-served defendant by dismissing the entire action without ruling on a timely - filed application for entry of default under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 55(a), thereby denying petitioners the ministerial entry of default against a non-appearing defendant. IV. Whether Native Hawaiian trust beneficiaries hold federally-protected rights enforceable under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against state actors who breach the federal trust, and whether Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, 603 U.S. 369 (2024), requires federal courts to determine those statutory entitlements independently, without deference to the administering state trustee’s self-serving interpretations. V. Whether a state community-development agency may serve as a “passthrough” to route federal surplus trust land to a county water board — outside its statutory authority and bypassing the section 5(f) public land trust — and whether that ultra vires transfer is a continuing breach rather than a completed, time-barred act. n