The hiring shortage for some government legal positions in Hawai’i is no longer a human resources headache. It is a crisis.
In Hawai’i, the deficit of legal talent has become so real – and so dangerous – that the machinery of justice has physically seized up. In Kailua-Kona, the Public Defender’s Office didn’t just slow down; they stopped accepting new Class A felonies and DUIs. There were simply no bodies to staff the court.
The reaction to this collapse has been drastic.
Faced with a reality where the integrity of the criminal justice system is dissolving, the Hawai’i Supreme Court has detonated the barriers to entry. In June 2025, Hawai’i launched a new pilot program that changes the fundamental physics of the Pacific legal market. The bar exam has been suspended for the sector that needs it most.
If you are a licensed attorney in good standing on the Mainland, you can now practice in Hawai’i without taking the bar exam. This waiver is specific, targeted, and urgent. It applies to attorneys working in criminal litigation for government agencies – the Attorney General, County Prosecutors, and the Public Defender.
The data made this move inevitable. New admissions have crashed from 206 in 2011 to just 138 last year. The resulting vacuum has created three massive opportunities for the mainland attorney looking for a strategic exit.
Maui County has shattered the ceiling, pushing deputy prosecutor salaries into the $122,000 to $213,000 band. Honolulu has raised its floor to nearly $100,000. These are serious numbers. The market response was instant: Maui received 70 applications almost immediately – a massive influx for an office that previously struggled to find applicants.
The pilot program runs through November 2027. Skeptics call it a temporary fix. Strategists call it a paid entry.
This program removes the friction of relocation. You land with a job, a salary, and immediate immersion in the local legal ecosystem. You spend two years building a reputation, learning the judges, and establishing local bona fides. When the pilot ends, you aren’t an outsider; you are a known quantity in a small market.
For the litigator tired of being a cog in the billable-hour machine, this is the ultimate pivot. In the saturated markets of the mainland, “making a mark” takes decades of political maneuvering. In Hawai’i, it takes showing up. This is a vacuum where ambition meets immediate necessity. You aren’t just taking a job; you are stepping into a jurisdiction where your presence physically keeps the wheels of justice turning. This is the difference between being an employee and being a protagonist. If you want to shape a legal landscape rather than just inhabit one, the opportunity is no longer theoretical. It is waiting for you in the Pacific.