POLITICS / HAWAII SENATE SEAT : GOP Sees Strong Chance of Taking Democrat’s Post : His party is marshaling forces behind incumbent Akaka. Republican Saiki has the backing of President Bush.

A Republican may knock an incumbent Democrat out of the U.S. Senate, and the prospect has both parties pulling out all the stops in the campaign.

“You can expect to see Bush, Quayle, the entire Cabinet, Mrs. Bush and Millie the dog in Hawaii if the race is really close,” said Anita Dunn, communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

She was only half joking. The contest between U.S. Rep. Patricia Saiki and Sen. Daniel K. Akaka is deadly serious for both parties. If Saiki prevails, she would help tilt the Senate balance in favor of the Republicans, now outnumbered 45 to 55. The GOP is angling to pick up enough seats in 1990 and 1992 to wrest control.

The latest poll, conducted by the Honolulu Advertiser and Channel 2 in Honolulu found Saiki leading Akaka 43% to 35% among all voters. There was no evidence of a gender gap, either. Saiki led among men 44% to 33%, and 42% to 37% among women. The poll surveyed 800 voters. The margin of error was 4 points in either direction.

The poll assumed, as do most observers, that the pair would be their parties’ nominees in November, although five lesser-known candidates are running in the Sept. 22 primaries. “It’s a key race for both parties,” says Wendy DeMocker, Dunn’s Republican counterpart.

Dunn ranks this Senate race “at the top of the list” nationally. Locally, the contest is overshadowing even the governor’s race. The articulate, assertive Saiki has already shown she can buck Hawaii’s Democratic Establishment by winning election to Congress in 1986. She is the first Republican to represent Hawaii in the House since it became a state in 1959.

“I may be a Republican, but I think people have accepted me as a person who is not ideologically constrained,” Saiki says. “People look at me as an individual.”

The 60-year-old legislator has the backing of President Bush, who personally urged her to run.

Aware of Saiki’s appeal, the Democratic Party is marshaling its forces. Akaka, who was appointed in May to replace the late Sen. Spark M. Matsunaga, has the support of popular Gov. John Waihee. Hawaii’s senior statesman, Democratic Sen. Daniel K. Inouye, is his honorary campaign chairman.

While Akaka and Saiki have staked out separate corners in the race, their backgrounds are strikingly similar. Both studied at the University of Hawaii and went on to work as schoolteachers before entering politics. Both have strong family ties, with five children apiece, and deep roots in the islands.

Akaka is the first Native Hawaiian to serve in the Senate. Saiki’s grandparents immigrated from Japan to work on Hawaii’s plantations.

But the two candidates’ styles are far apart. Saiki, a careful and practical politician, is seen as the tougher of the two. A sharp debater, she stresses her ability to get the ear of the President and Senate Republicans. She faults Bush for reneging on his “no new taxes” pledge, but calls herself a moderate Republican committed to education, women’s rights and the environment.

Akaka, 65, paints himself as the grass-roots candidate, “up against the White House, the President and big money.”

An easy-going, down-home fellow, he relies on friendly persuasion to push Hawaii’s interests at the Capitol. The 13-year House veteran says he brings home the bacon for Hawaii, from building harbors to protecting sugar industry jobs. “I have a style that works, that delivers for Hawaii,” he says.

In the latest poll, Saiki leads Akaka comfortably among Japanese-American and Caucasian voters, while Akaka led strongly among Native Hawaiians.

“At this moment . . . Saiki has got to be seen as the one who has the best go at it,” says political commentator Dan Boylan. “If a tough enough campaign were run against her, that might change. But Akaka is a nice guy, and that wouldn’t be in his nature. She’s the one that’s more likely to get tough.”

The election is the first serious challenge for Akaka since he took his seat in the House in 1976, a fact that some say may be working against him.

“His problem has been that no one has beaten the drum for him,” says Dennis O’Connor, Democratic Party chairman. “He’s not had opposition, so no one has bothered to tell the people of Hawaii all the things he’s been doing. Saiki was running for reelection from the minute she went to Washington.”