The ruling is another victory for the Jan. 6 select committee.
A federal judge Tuesday ordered John Eastman — the attorney who developed former President Donald Trump’s last-ditch strategy to overturn the election — to disclose a batch of 159 sensitive documents to the Jan. 6 select committee, including another email that the judge said presented evidence of a likely crime.
In a 26-page ruling, U.S. District Court Judge David Carter also ordered Eastman to provide 10 documents about meetings Eastman held with a secretive pro-Trump group that included a “high-profile” leader discussing strategies for overturning the 2020 election.
The 10 documents in question related to three December meetings held by the group. “Five documents include the agenda for a meeting on December 9, 2020,” the California-based judge indicated. “The agenda included a section entitled “GROUND GAME following Nov 4 Election Results,” during which a sitting Member of Congress discussed a “[p]lan to challenge the electors in the House of Representatives.” Other meetings of the group took place on Dec. 8 and Dec. 16, Carter noted.
“The Select Committee has a substantial interest in these three meetings because the presentations furthered a critical objective of the January 6 plan: to have contested states certify alternate slates of electors for President Trump,” he ruled. “Dr. Eastman’s actions in these few weeks indicate that his and President Trump’s pressure campaign to stop the electoral count did not end with Vice President Pence — it targeted every tier of federal and state elected officials. Convincing state legislatures to certify competing electors was essential to stop the count and ensure President Trump’s reelection.”
The ruling is another victory for the Jan. 6 select committee as it prepares to present its findings to the public. Eastman was ordered to deliver the new batch of emails to the select committee by 5 p.m. Wednesday, the day before the panel’s first public hearing.
Among the documents Carter ordered disclosed were several communications directly from Trump, which Carter said were not protected by his attorney-client relationship with the president. One of the documents was a photo with a handwritten note from Trump about the size of his campaign rallies, and two were relayed by Trump’s executive assistant and sought advice for framing Trump’s public statements about a plan to send alternate slates of electors to Congress — an element of the effort to overturn the election.
The single email that Carter said pertained to a potential crime was an exchange on Dec. 22, 2020, in which an unidentified attorney encouraged Trump’s legal team not to pursue a case in court related to the Jan. 6 session of Congress.
“Because the attorney concluded that a negative court ruling would ‘tank the January 6 strategy,’ he encouraged the legal team to avoid the courts,” Carter indicated.
“This email cemented the direction of the January 6 plan,” Carter continued. “The Trump legal team chose not to seek recourse in court — instead, they forged ahead with a political campaign to disrupt the electoral count. Lawyers are free not to bring cases; they are not free to evade judicial review to overturn a democratic election. Accordingly, this portion of the email is subject to the crime-fraud exception and must be disclosed.”
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BREAKING: A federal judge has ordered a new batch of John Eastman's emails delivered to the Jan. 6 select committee, including another one he says is evidence of a likely crime related to the effort to overturn the elecftion.
Details TK pic.twitter.com/P1XY0hVIbN
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) June 8, 2022
"Dr. Eastman’s actions in these few weeks indicate that his and President Trump’s pressure campaign to stop the electoral count did not end with Vice President Pence— it targeted every tier of federal and state elected officials."https://t.co/TToHcNtyqy
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) June 8, 2022
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