Thread by @meghanncuniff

Amid the #J6 Chapman subpoena fight with Judge Carter, John Eastman just took the mic as the dinner speaker at the California Republican Assembly’s convention here at the Knott’s Berry Farm Hotel in Buena Park, California. The crowd is small but very receptive.

An InfoWars banner was the first thing I saw when I walked up the stairs to the dinner room.

Here’s the scene. Eastman started by talking about authoritarianism and COVID restrictions and has since moved into the 2020 election and the Arizona audit.

This is a three-day convention, with former California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder speaking at the breakfast tomorrow. I got here a little late, but there were still some candidate booths set up, and this merchandise stash.

Eastman is going over election fraud claims he shared in the speech he gave at the “Stop the Steal” rally in DC on Jan. 6, 2021, before the violent riot started at the Capitol. He’s saying stuff like, “Another thing I said on January 6 was…”

I have got much much more to share, but for now, during a Q & A with Eastman, a man stood up and he said he was at Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and people keep calling it an insurrection, “and I think one day they’re going to put it in the history books” if we don’t stand up. #J6

Regarding crowd size, I estimate there are 100 to 120 people here. (Describing crowd size as large or small is of course relative. I’m used to OC legal community dinners, not political dinners, and the crowds are much larger at the legal events.)

They have moved on to the live auction portion of the night, and this Let’s Go Brandon mat just sold for $65.

This large red Make America Great Again sweatshirt was going for $80 to the first bidder after no other bidders chimed in, but someone offered $85 just after the bid closed. They have another sweatshirt so apparently both bidders are getting a new hoodie tonight.

Eastman holds court with supporters after the dinner.

A couple notable hats here, this SuperTrump hat and also someone who snagged a hat in the live auction went around having Eastman and others sign it afterward.

Eastman talked directly about the current privilege-review over the #J6 subpoenas to Chapman and Judge Carter's review. “As you may know, I’ve been involved in some litigation with the @January6Commitee,” he said to slight applause.

“They somehow think I’ve got smoking guns that are going to prove that we were going to - I don’t even want to - I’ve got to be careful what I say because I’m still in the fight with them,” Eastman told the crowd.

“Now, you wouldn’t know that from reading the press, that we won. We filed suit to block Chapman from turning those documents over without my ability to give them a privilege review. And we won that," Eastman continued.

"The judge, Judge Carter granted our TRO. You certainly wouldn't know that from the press," Eastman told the crowd.
Um, excuse me? I wrote an entire article about that TRO, and I've mentioned it many many times since. bit.ly/3AnZPVX

I asked Eastman a few questions afterward, and he wasn't aware that the #J6 committee's opposition to his request for discovery from Chapman was filed today, so I told him to be sure to follow me on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/meghanncuniff/status/1505224495010787332

Eastman took issue with this @ocregister editorial headlined, "Judge slams John Eastman’s shenanigans." He said he discussed this with @latimes today, which makes me really want to read whatever Eastman article the Times is apparently currently working on. bit.ly/3tp9qKp

"I asked the @latimes earlier today if now that the @ocregister has conceded the conservative libertarian turf, if they’re going to move to fill in that void. Because somebody needs to do it in this state," Eastman said.

I’m calling it a night and will share more tomorrow. But first, the last speaker of the night was Sany Dash, who owns Trump merchandise stores across the country and told the crowd she raises money “for people who are in trouble for January 6th.”

“Because we have stores everywhere, we had a lot of people come to our stores, and unfortunately we know the majority of them that are in jail. So we do want to help them out. We give money to them directly. We do not go through groups,” USA Trump Store owner Sany Dash said. #J6

OK - a few more thoughts. Sany Dash wasn’t so much as a speaker as she was the introduction to the live auction, which featured her merchandise. The California Republican Assembly president said she traveled from NYC to be there and the auction was raising money for the CRA.

In addition to comments above about raising money for people in trouble for #J6, Sany said her team raises money "for those that support Trump and any groups that are actively not RINOs." (The live auctioneer was California gubernatorial candidate Leo Zacky.)

Before auction, Eastman spoke on and off for about an hour. He defended the election fraud claims and was quite forceful about it. (I had wondered when he filed the discovery motion against @ChapmanU the other day if he was trying ramp up an even bigger and more public pushback)

Eastman called for people to be prosecuted and imprisoned for election fraud (he didn’t name names), and he said wrongful death lawsuits should be filed over the deaths during the Capitol riots (he didn’t name defendants).

Background: This event was not difficult to get into. Quite the opposite. Here’s the event website. A @lawdotcom colleague got a list serve media invitation and passed it to me because of my coverage of the Eastman #J6 Chapman subpoenas with Judge Carter. bit.ly/3IsqfZg

I emailed the listed media contact and she told me John Eastman was speaking Saturday from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. and asked me to check in at the registration booth when I arrived. (She also thanked me for my interest.)

Eastman structured his speech to peak with the fight over the @January6thCmte subpoenas, starting by talking about how “we are in an authoritarian moment” and lamenting “censorship” of opposing views on COVID mandates etc decided by “our masters in Washington” at CDC or FDA.

John Eastman on science: “Any true scientist knows that that’s not how you do science. The way you do science is by questioning and probing and challenging. We’re not allowed to do that anymore. That’s the very definition of authoritarianism.”

Fighting this “is just a culmination of a movement in this country that dates back more than a century. It dates back to Woodrow Wilson and the beginning of the progressive movement,” Eastman said.

“Every single major media news story to this day uses the adjective baseless when mentioning claims of election fraud and illegality. The notion that those claims are baseless is false. It is a lie,” Eastman said.

Eastman's explanation for this was that most election fraud cases were dismissed on jurisdictional or standing grounds “and never got to the merits.” He didn't say which ones.

Eastman: “Of the eight cases that even looked at a sliver of the merits Trump’s campaign team won six of the eight. How many of you have seen that reported in @NYTimes or @washingtonpost? No, because they regurgitate, ‘every single case rejected Trump’s claims. It’s just lies.”

(Again, Eastman didn’t explain which cases he’s referring to, and I do not see which could qualify.)

Eastman referenced the “short-lived” audit in Fulton County Georgia.

“They got access to forensic machines for a little bit before the judge changed his mind and dismissed the case,” Eastman said.

Eastman didn’t mention that the dismissal came after investigators told the judge they hadn’t found any evidence of fraud, as this @ajc report explains: bit.ly/37FAaxL

Eastman also referenced a January appellate court decision in Pennsylvania that said no-excuse mail-in voting is unconstitutional. “How many heard that story? Not many. It doesn’t make it around.”

Here’s some coverage of that ruling from January, which is now under appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court
wesa.fm/politics-gover… and spotlightpa.org/news/2022/01/p…

Eastman also referenced the report in Wisconsin from former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman.

Eastman said Gableman is "still going because a lot of the counties and the states were refusing to cooperate with his subpoenas, that were validly authorized by the legislature.” (Remember, the reason I listened to this speech is Eastman fighting #J6 subpoenas to Chapman.)

Eastman called Gableman’s report “damning.” He said state election officials violated state law by being too lenient with mail-in voting. bit.ly/3InfyqJ

Notable: Eastman told the dinner crowd Justice Gableman was hired by Wisconsin’s “legislative office of special counsel,” but the only reference I find to that office is a Facebook post about this very issue.

Many news reports about this audit say Gableman was hired by the Wisconsin Republicans. This article also notes “A legislative audit and study by a conservative group found no signs of significant voter fraud.” bit.ly/3N53KNw

This article says GOP Wisconsin House speaker earlier this month extended Gableman’s contract.

"Feeling pressure from Trump, Vos last summer named Gableman as special counsel and gave him a taxpayer-funded budget of $676,000 to look into the election." bit.ly/3InfyqJ

Eastman also said last night: “A third thing I said in my little talk on January 6 was, ‘the machines were capable of storing preloaded ballots to be deployed as needed.’” (Diners murmured in outrage, not at the first part, at the last part.)

“I’m working on a book. I’m going to call it quote, “A Big Lie” because the truth is the claims of the big election fraud being a big lie were a big lie,” Eastman said. “I’m not even getting into the statistical evidence. The statistical evidence is stunning."

“What’s most troubling to me is we’re not allowed to talk about it, we’re not allowed to raise these questions,” Eastman said of 2020 election fraud claims, talking about it before a group of about 120 while detailing all these questions being raised about it.

"If you do, like I said, the heavens open up against you and all the forces come against you. Believe me I know. My old professor used to say, ‘if you’re not catching incoming flack it means you’re not over the target,'" Eastman said.

"Well ladies and gentlemen I think I have been directly over the target for quite some time,” to applause. That got into the above comments, about how #J6 committee thinks “I’ve got smoking guns” but couldn’t get info from him so they “went after my former employer” @ChapmanU.

Eastman said Chapman falsely claimed he didn’t remove all his files; he said he did remove his electronic files “but unbeknownst to me they had kept archival copies of everything.”

Eastman also suggested Chapman initiated this by contacting @January6thCmte. “When the January 6 Committee came knocking, or was invited to come knocking, I don’t know, they were going to turn over 94,000 pages of my files...” w/o review.

Eastman said his “ethical duties as a lawyer” require that he defend his clients’ confidences “at every peril to myself” so he secured the temporary restraining order from Judge Carter (as first reported here by @lawdotcom in January: bit.ly/3AnZPVX)

“I’m sorry, I did my ethical duty to do what was necessary to protect client privilege materials if I didn’t do that someone could have filed a complaint against me for not at my peril doing everything I could to protect their privileged communications with me,” Eastman said.

Eastman later mentioned someone filed a @StateBarCA complaint against him over #J6, but he didn’t mention state bar announced earlier an investigation into him. It's also more than just one person who filed a complaint, as this @lawdotcom story explains. bit.ly/3C3lZ0y

“I asked at the beginning, is this our authoritarian movement? I think the answer is, 'We are in an authoritarian moment. Is it the beginning of an authoritarian epic?' And ladies and gentlemen, the answer to that question is vested in you. Thanks so much.”

That seemed to be the end, but he was just taking a break. During break, a woman said she once called Eastman seeking legal advice and he was dining with @TedCruz and Justice Scalia, but he called her back about 12:30 a.m. DC time. “That’s the kind of gentleman that he is.”

Eastman started speaking again a few minutes later between bites of an entree, again discussing Gableman’s audit in Wisconsin and saying the question is, what can we do about this?

“The first thing we’ve got to do about it is expose it and criminally prosecute the people who were engaged in that conduct and toughen our laws to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Eastman said to applause.

One baffling question: Someone asked Eastman about “these folks that are filing lawsuits against you” and if they can be labeled vexatious litigants.

The lawsuit I’m following right now was initiated by Eastman, and that’s the only one he’s discussed. bit.ly/3ueXWIt

Eastman used that question to reference the new bar complaint against him and @The65Project “that’s going to file bar complaints against all of the lawyer that were involved in any of the lawsuits bringing election challenges.”

“When you’re giving advice to a client that’s perfectly lawful and faithful to what the Constitution requires one would suspect hat such complaints wouldn’t go anywhere,” Eastman said. (He is of course not at all wrong here.)

Eastman also told diners, "You need to go into your county clerks. You need to look at the voter list. You know who lives in your neighborhood and who doesn’t. And if there are people on those rolls who haven’t lived there for 28 years, get the rolls cleaned up."

Eastman also urged them to “volunteer to be poll watchers.” Make sure absentee signatures are being checked “and if they’re not, contact a lawyer to get an affidavit and a declaration that can be evidence in a court action.”

“If everyone of you does it and everyone of your friends does it and everyone of your neighbors does it, we’re an army. I shouldn’t use ‘an army.’ ... You wouldn’t want to call Biden. We’re a force to be reckoned with,” Eastman said.

"There were 75, 80 million people that voted the right way. That’s a force to be reckoned. All we have to do is keep talking about what went on, and keep our eyes on the election fraud that is prevented from happening again, and we take back our country," Eastman said.

Then he slipped in a fundraising plea and plugged his online fundraiser, which he said isn’t on GoFundMe “because we knew they would block it.”
“You may know that I’ve got a lot of lawyers working with me at the moment,” Eastman said.

(Eastman did not name his lawyers, but the only lawyers with names on this litigation are Charles Burnham in DC and Anthony Caso in Anaheim. Burnham has been doing all the hearings with Judge Carter.)

"Even if you don’t have the ability to send some money to help with the legal defense, you can send a prayer. And I gotta tell you how heartwarming that is to me and my family in particular to see those prayers come in," Eastman said.

The same man who said he fears history books will call it an insurrection referenced Ashli Babbitt, fatal heart attack (Kevin Greeson propublica.org/article/the-ra…), woman who was crushed to death (Roseanne Boyland nytimes.com/2021/01/15/us/…) and asked why no lawsuits have been filed.

“I hope there will be. The statute of limitations hasn’t wrung on those, and I hope there will be,” Eastman said about wrongful death #J6 lawsuits. He offered no details about who lawsuits would be filed against but quickly added: “I spoke to a half million people that day.”

Eastman said there were 700 people at the other end of the mall who broke into the capitol, and he said he had evidence that some were “some of the instigators of that were FBI informant” but cut short, didn’t say what evidence and then transitioned into Antifa breaking a window.

Amid all this, Eastman did throw this in: “That’s not to say Trump supporters didn’t get caught up in the enthusiasm.”

But he added: “The grounds of the Capitol are public lands. Normally you can wander on them all your own.”

Eastman said a lot of people didn’t know they were walking into off limits area “and these are the things that the trials are going to expose.”
“What are we more than a year after this and only a few have even gone to trial?”

It’s actually one who’s gone to trial, and he was convicted, and everyone should make a point of reading as much trial coverage as they can, which you can find everywhere. nyti.ms/367wQv7

Eastman then referenced Brady v. Maryland and implied cases are being delayed because the government ins’t releasing exculpatory evidence, which puts him in with Jeff Fortenberry’s lawyer and Michael Avenatti for yet another bold Brady claim.

https://twitter.com/meghanncuniff/status/1504580224503017473

Eastman also returned for a third time to railing on @OCRegister (I used to work there), saying previously that the old owner RC Hoiles "would be turning over in his grave to see what’s going on at that paper right now."

Eastman imploring @ocregister to do some investigative reporting into all the injustices going on in the Jan. 6 prosecutions. He did not mention this recent investigation by @TeriSforza. bit.ly/3IrWE2b

A man asked: “John, is there anybody pushing back the other way? Do we have some good guys out there wearing white hats, trying to keep the bad guys in line?”
Eastman hummed a bit then said, “There’s me” to cheers and applause.

“And if I lose my fight over my privileged documents, you’ll find a lot of other people that were working with me and will lose their jobs at @MIT or wherever they’re working,” Eastman continued.

Eastman said he had statisticians, physicists and mathematicians at prestigious institutions working for him, and they asked him to keep their names private so they don’t lose their jobs.

He said he’s challenging #J6 Chapman subpoenas for them. “I’m trying to keep their name out of it by defending their right to have communicated with me on attorney client product material so that they don’t go through what my family and I have gone through.”

"I do know that if we don’t get to the bottom of what went on, it won't stop. 2022, 2024, for as far as the eye can see, people need to go to prison for engaging in election fraud. It’s just that simple," Eastman said.

"It's us. It's us the people in this room and rooms like it all across the country that need to let them now we're watching and that w'ere going to hold them to account," Eastman said.

Eastman ended: "They work for us, and we need to let them know what those first three words of the Constitution are." Then California Republican Assembly President Johnnie Morgan introduced Sany Dash and the night-ending auction began. (Morgan is pictured here with Eastman.)

Here is the thread on John Eastman’s Saturday night speech at the California Republican Assembly convention, all in one place. #J6 bit.ly/3qppvOq