Saiki, Patricia F. (Patricia Fukuda), 1930-

Patricia Hatsue Saiki (née Fukuda; born May 28, 1930) is an American politician and educator from Hilo, Hawaii. A member of the Republican Party, she served in the U.S. House from Hawaii's 1st Congressional district from 1987 to 1991 and as Administrator of the Small Business Administration under President of the United States George H. W. Bush from 1991 to 1993.

Born in Hilo, Hawaii, she graduated from Hilo High School in 1948 and received her bachelor's degree from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in 1952. In 1954, she married Stanley Saiki, an obstetrician. Patricia Saiki taught history in Hawaii’s public and private schools for 12 years. In the mid-1960s, Saiki served as the secretary and then the vice chair of the state Republican Party. She attended the state constitutional convention in 1968, and that year won election to the Hawaii house of representatives, where she served for six years. In 1974 Saiki won election to the state senate, where she served until 1982. In 1982 Saiki left the legislature and made an unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor.

After spending nearly two decades in state politics, Saiki decided to run for the U.S. House seat vacated in July 1986 by five-term Democrat Cecil Heftel. Though Saiki lost the special election in September by less than 1,000 votes, she won the general election in November, becoming the first Repblican to represent Hawaii in the House since it had gained statehood. While in office, Saiki focused on education-related issues. She was a commissioner for the Western Interstate Commission on Higher Education, and was a member of the Fund for the Improvement of Higher Education. Though fiscally conservative, she also pushed for the redress of Japanese Americans for their internment during World War II. In April 1990, Hawaii Senator Spark Matsunaga died of cancer. Urged by President George H. W. Bush, Saiki entered the election to fill the islands’ vacant seat. Though a more dynamic candidate than interim Senator Daniel Akaka, Saiki ultimately lost to Akaka by a nine point margin.

After Saiki left Congress, President Bush appointed her director of the Small Business Administration, where she served from 1991 to 1993. In 1993 she taught at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. The following year, she became the first woman candidate on a major party ticket for Hawaii governor, losing a three-way race to Democratic Lieutenant Governor Ben Cayetano. Saiki chaired the Hawaii Presidential campaign of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani in 2008 and the 2010 and 2012 congressional campaigns of Charles Djou and served from 2014 to 2015 as chair of the Republican Party of Hawaii. She lives in Honolulu.