# John Eastman The constitutional law professor who wrote the **legal blueprint for a coup** — the "Eastman memo," a 2-page document outlining how [[Vice President Pence]] could unilaterally reject electoral votes or accept fraudulent "alternate" slates of electors, overturning the 2020 election result. Eastman is the most dangerous figure in the Stop the Steal operation because he provided the **legal theory** that could have given the coup a constitutional veneer. He is also the clearest connection between the [[Claremont Institute]]'s intellectual project and real-world insurrectionary action. ## Background - **Born**: 1960 - **Education**: University of Chicago (BA), University of Chicago Law School (JD), clerked for Justice [[Clarence Thomas]] - **Academic**: Professor and former dean, Chapman University Dale E. Fowler School of Law - **Institutional**: Senior fellow, [[Claremont Institute]]; [[Federalist Society]] member - **Credentials**: This was not a fringe figure — Eastman had clerked for a Supreme Court justice, led a law school, and was embedded in mainstream conservative legal institutions ## The Eastman Memo On **January 4, 2021** — two days before the Capitol attack — Eastman circulated a 2-page memo outlining a theory for how VP Pence could overturn the election: ### The 6-Step Plan 1. Pence announces that "ichigan has not yet been certified" due to "ongoing disputes" (false) 2. Pence declares he will not count electoral votes from 7 "disputed" states 3. Without those states, neither candidate has 270 electoral votes 4. The election is thrown to the House of Representatives under the [[12th Amendment]] 5. In a House contingent election, each *state delegation* gets one vote (not each member) 6. Republicans controlled 26 of 50 state delegations → Trump wins ### Why It Was Lawless The memo relied on a theory (the "independent state legislature" doctrine) that had no historical basis and was later rejected by the Supreme Court in *[[Moore v. Harper]]* (2023). The VP has no constitutional authority to unilaterally reject electoral votes. Eastman himself acknowledged in emails that his theory would lose 9-0 at the Supreme Court — but argued it should be attempted anyway. **The significance**: This wasn't a social media conspiracy theory. It was a legal memorandum from a Clarence Thomas clerk and Federalist Society member, distributed within the White House, providing a procedural mechanism for overturning a presidential election. It was the most sophisticated coup attempt in American history — dressed in constitutional law professor clothing. ## The Fake Electors Connection Eastman's memo required fraudulent elector slates to exist — otherwise Pence had nothing to point to as "competing" certifications. This made the memo the **demand signal** for the fake electors scheme operated by [[Kenneth Chesebro]] and [[Boris Epshteyn]] in 7 states. The legal theory and the operational fraud were designed as interlocking components. ## The Claremont Connection Eastman was a senior fellow at the [[Claremont Institute]] — the intellectual home of the post-liberal right and the source of the "Flight 93 Election" essay that framed the 2016 election as a civilizational crisis. The Claremont Institute's intellectual project — that American institutions are so corrupted that extraordinary measures are justified to save the republic — provided the ideological scaffolding for Eastman's legal theory. His memo was Claremont's philosophy converted into a procedural mechanism. ## Consequences | Domain | Outcome | |--------|---------| | **California Bar** | Disbarred (March 2024) — the bar court found he engaged in dishonesty and violated professional responsibilities | | **Georgia RICO** | Indicted as one of 19 defendants in Fulton County | | **Federal** | Named as "Co-Conspirator 2" in the federal Trump election case | | **Chapman University** | Resigned under pressure (January 2021) | | **[[Jan 6 Committee]]** | Invoked the [[5th Amendment]] 100+ times in deposition | ## See Also - [[Stop the Steal]] - [[Claremont Institute]] - [[Federalist Society]] - [[Rudy Giuliani]] - [[Sidney Powell]] - [[January 6 Capitol Attack]]