John Eastman, the conservative attorney who pushed a plan to keep Donald Trump in power, turned himself in to authorities Tuesday on charges in the Georgia case alleging an illegal plot to overturn the former president’s 2020 election loss.
Eastman was booked at the Fulton County jail and is expected to have an arraignment in the coming weeks in the sprawling racketeering case.
He was indicted last week alongside Trump and 17 others, who are accused by District Attorney Fani Willis of scheming to subvert the will of Georgia voters in a desperate bid to keep Joe Biden out of the White House. It was the fourth criminal case brought against the Republican former president.
Trump, whose bond was set Monday at $200,000, has said he will surrender to authorities in Fulton County on Thursday. His bond conditions prohibit him from intimidating co-defendants, witnesses or victims in the case, including on social media. He has a history of assailing the prosecutors leading the cases against him, including Willis.
Eastman said in a statement provided by his lawyers that he was surrendering Tuesday “to an indictment that should never have been brought.” He criticized the indictment for targeting “attorneys for their zealous advocacy on behalf of their clients” and said each of the 19 defendants was entitled to rely on the advice of lawyers and past legal precedent to challenge the results of the election.
A former dean of Chapman University Law School in Southern California, Eastman was a close adviser to Trump in the run-up to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by the president’s supporters intent on halting the certification of Biden’s electoral victory. He wrote a memo laying out steps Vice President Mike Pence could take to stop the counting of electoral votes while presiding over Congress’ joint session on Jan. 6 in order to keep Trump in office.
After the 2020 election, Eastman and others pushed to put in place a slate of “alternate” electors falsely certifying that Trump won and tried to pressure Pence to reject or delay the counting of legitimate electoral votes for Biden, a Democrat.
Bail bondsman Scott Hall, who was accused of participating in a breach of election equipment in rural Coffee County, Georgia, also turned himself in to the Fulton County Jail on Tuesday.
Two other defendants, former Justice Department lawyer Jeffrey Clark and former Georgia Republican Party chair David Shafer, have filed paperwork aiming to transfer the case to federal court. Willis has filed paperwork in Fulton County Superior Court, where the indictment was filed, seeking a March 4 trial date. Legal maneuvering, such as the attempts to move the case to federal court, could make it difficult to start a trial that soon.
Lawyers for Clark argued in their court filing Monday that he was a high-ranking Justice Department official and the actions described in the indictment “relate directly to his work at the Justice Department as well as with the former President of the United States.” Shafer’s attorneys argued that his conduct “stems directly from his service as a Presidential Elector nominee,” actions they say were “at the direction of the President and other federal officers.”
Clark’s attorneys also asked the federal court to stay any proceedings in Fulton County Superior Court — including the execution of any arrest warrant — until a determination has been made whether the case should be moved to federal court. U.S. District Judge Steve Jones gave Willis’ office until 3 p.m. Wednesday to respond.
Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows last week made similar arguments in a federal court filing, saying his actions were taken in service to his White House role. A judge has scheduled a hearing for Monday in that case.
Clark was a staunch supporter of Trump’s false claims of election fraud and in December 2020 presented colleagues with a draft letter pushing Georgia officials to convene a special legislative session on the election results, according to testimony before the U.S. House committee that investigated the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Clark wanted the letter sent, but Justice Department superiors refused.
Shafer was one of 16 Georgia Republicans who signed a certificate declaring falsely that Trump had won the 2020 presidential election in the state and declaring themselves the “duly elected and qualified” electors even though Biden had won the state and a slate of Democratic electors was certified.
Lawyers for Shafer and the district attorney’s office on Tuesday agreed to a bond of $75,000. Also Tuesday, a court filing showed that bond has been set at $10,000 for Shawn Still, another of the fake electors who was elected to the Georgia state Senate in November 2022 and represents a district in Atlanta’s suburbs.
(AP)
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
3 Responses
Indicting Eastman for literally nothing but giving his honest legal opinion is an act of contempt not only for the first and fifth amendments but also for the entire third article.
What legal advice?
He committed crimes. In a conspiracy. RICO. Jail.
On or about the 3rd day of December 2020, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS
GIULIANI, JOHN CHARLES EASTMAN, JENNA LYNN ELLIS, and RAY STALLINGS SMITH III committed the felony offense of SOLICITATION OF VIOLATION OF OATH BY PUBLIC OFFICER, in Violation of O.C.G.A. §§ 16-47 & 16-10-1, in Fulton County, Georgia, by unlawfully soliciting, requesting, and importuning certain public officers then serving as elected members of the Georgia Senate and present at a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee meeting, including unindicted co-conspirator Individual 8, Whose identity is known to the Grand Jury, Senators Lee Anderson, Brandon Beach, Matt Brass, Greg Dolezal, Steve Gooch, Tyler Harper, Bill Heath, Jen Jordan, John F. Kennedy, William Ligon, Elena Parent, Michael Rhett, Carden Summers, and Blake Tillery, to engage in conduct constituting the felony offense of Violation of Oath by Public Officer, O.C.G.A. § 16 10- 1, by unlawfully appointing presidential electors from Georgia, in willful and intentional Violation of the terms of the oath of said persons as prescribed by law, with intent that said persons engage in said
conduct. This was an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy.
On or about the 8th day of December 2020, DONALD JOHN TRUMP and JOHN CHARLES EASTMAN placed a telephone call to Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel to request her assistance gathering certain individuals to meet and cast electoral votes for DONALD JOHN TRUMP on December 14, 2020, in certain states despite the fact that DONALD JOHN TRUMP’ lost the November 3, 2020, presidential election in those states. This was an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy.
On or about the 31st day of December 2020, DONALD JOHN TRUMP and JOHN CHARLES EASTMAN committed the felony offense of FILING FALSE DOCUMENTS, in violation of O.C.G.A. § 16-10-20.1(b)(1), in Fulton County, Georgia, by knowingly filing a document titled “VERIFIED COMPLAINT FOR EMERGENCY INJUNCTIVE AND DECLARATORY RELIEF” in the matter of Trump V. Kemp, Case 1:20cv05310-MHC, in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, a court of the United States having reason to know that said document contained at least one of the following materially false statements:
l. That “as many as 2,506 felons with an uncompleted sentence” voted illegally in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Georgia;
2. That “at least 66,247 underage” people voted illegally in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Georgia;
3. That “at least 2,423 individuals” voted illegally in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Georgia “who were not listed in the State’s records as having been registered to vote”;
4. That “at least 1,043 individuals” voted illegally in the November 3, 2020, presidential election “who had illegally registered to vote using a postal office box as their habitation”; –
5. That “as many as 10,315 or more” dead people voted in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Georgia;
6. That “[d]eliberate misinformation was used to instruct Republican poll watchers and members of the press to leave the premises for the night at approximately 10:00 p.m. on November 3, 2020” at State Farm Arena in Fulton County, Georgia; Earlier on the same day, JOHN CHARLES EASTMAN sent an email to attorneys associated with the Trump Campaign admitting his knowledge that at least some of the allegations in the verified complaint were not accurate. This filing was an act of racketeering activity under O.C.G.A. § 16-14-3(5)(A)(xxii) and an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy.
No, Jackk, he did not commit any crimes whatsoever. He gave legal advice, which is protected by both the first and fifth amendment, and is the very basis of the entire legal system.
You cut and paste the indictment by that filthy lying female dog Willis; when you lie down with dogs, especially lying dogs, you wake up with fleas. None of the charges have any substance to them at all. Far from urging officials to violate their oaths, he urged them to fulfill their oaths and do their duty as he saw it. Those officials were of course entitled to disagree with his assessment of their duty, and act accordingly.