John Eastman
We know there was fraud [and] we know that dead people voted… [and] all we are demanding of Vice President Pence is this afternoon at one o’clock, he let the legislatures of the states… and the American people know whether we have control over the direction of our government. John Eastman at a D.C. Trump Rally - January 6, 2021
John Eastman, a former clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas, is a criminally indicted election denier who urged Trump to overturn the 2020 election. Eastman was recommended to be disbarred in California based on evidence that he “abandoned his ethical and legal duties as an attorney to conspire with then-President Donald Trump to develop and implement a strategy to obstruct the counting of electoral votes on January 6, 2021, and illegally disrupt the peaceful transfer of power to President-elect Joseph Biden.” Eastman is facing forgery, conspiracy and other criminal charges in Georgia related to a scheme to subvert election results, and was over a dozen individuals charged in an Arizona indictment filed in connection with an election subversion scheme in the state. Eastman was also suspended from practicing law in Washington D.C. on an interim basis - he has denied any wrongdoing. Eastman is a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute, a Project 2025 Advisory Board member.
In what has been called his “blueprint for a coup” memo, Eastman outlined a plan for then-Vice President Pence to reject the electoral results from the six states (plus New Mexico) that would submit alternate–in reality fraudulent and unauthorized–electors. He asserted that Article II of the Constitution grants state legislatures “the plenary power to determine the manner for choosing presidential electors.” Eastman also asserted that the authority to determine which ballots are valid “is [Pence’s] alone” and the only thing “members of Congress can do is watch.”
Eastman’s assertions gave Arizona State Senator Karen Fann a roadmap for convening a special session without a two-thirds majority of the legislature that is required by law. Eastman also wrote a letter to Wisconsin Rep. Timothy Ramthun, in which he claimed the “state legislatures … do have the authority to de-certify the election of presidential electors.”
Eastman has also aided Cleta Mitchell, another Trump attorney facing potential legal consequences for her role in trying to subvert the 2020 election. In 2022, Eastment addressed a summit for the Conservative Partnership Institute, where Cleta is a Senior Legal Fellow, giving directions on how to challenge voters at the polls in 2022, activities which could be seen as voter intimidation. Eastman has also continued to back Trump, asserting that Trump’s Jan. 6 “indictment is as full of half truths and distortions of the actual record as the long-running ‘Russian collusion’ hoax was. But the deep state is bent on pushing the false narrative that there was nothing wrong with the 2020 election.”
Eastman is currently Senior Fellow and Founding Director of the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence at the Claremont Institute, a Project 2025 Advisory Board Member and right-wing non-profit group bankrolled by Thomas Klingenstein. Eastman has used that post to file amicus briefs attacking constitutional protections for abortion, assailing gun safety measures, opposition affirmative action to redress structural racism, and challenging the power of agency experts to regulate industry. He is a vocal opponent of marriage equality and LGBTQ+ rights and chaired the board of the National Organization for Marriage.
In 2020, Eastman was widely rebuked for publishing an op-ed titled “Some Questions for Kamala Harris About Eligibility” that claimed Kamala was ineligible for office given her parents’ immigration status. Per the Center for Media and Democracy, “this birtherism attack [was] styled after Trump’s racist and absurd claim that President Obama was not born in the U.S.”