'Provide some cover': New Eastman emails shed light on his push to overturn Biden's win

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Politico

LEGAL

'Provide some cover': New Eastman emails shed light on his push to overturn Biden's win

He suggested a way for Pennsylvania legislators to cancel Joe Biden's win.

By KYLE CHENEY

05/10/2022 11:14 PM EDT

Updated: 05/11/2022 12:28 AM EDT

Attorney John Eastman urged Republican legislators in Pennsylvania to retabulate the state's popular vote -- and throw out tens of thousands of absentee ballots -- in order to show Donald Trump with a lead, according to newly unearthed emails sent in December 2020, as Trump pressured GOP lawmakers to subvert his defeat. ... This recalculation, he posited in an exchange with one GOP state lawmaker, "would help provide some cover" for Republicans to replace Joe Biden's electors from the state with a slate of pro-Trump electors, part of a last-ditch bid to overturn the election results.

Per the exchange, Eastman suggested that GOP legislators could simply cite their concerns with Pennsylvania's absentee ballot procedures and then use historical data to "discount each candidates' totals by a prorated amount based on the absentee percentage those candidates otherwise received." ... "Having done that math, you'd be left with a significant Trump lead that would bolster the argument for the Legislature adopting a slate of Trump electors -- perfectly within your authority to do anyway, but now bolstered by the untainted popular vote," Eastman wrote in a Dec. 4, 2020 email to Pennsylvania Rep. Russ Diamond. "That would help provide some cover." ... Biden ultimately won Pennsylvania by more than 80,000 votes.

The exchange was part of a batch of emails obtained from the University of Colorado, where Eastman worked as a visiting professor at the time he was helping Trump strategize ways to remain in power. The emails were obtained via public records requests by the Colorado Ethics Institute, which sent them along to the Jan. 6 select committee last month. It’s unclear whether the select committee had previously obtained these emails — which are available via public records requests — or whether they are in receipt of the Colorado group’s files. ... The Denver Post first reported on the existence of the emails. (1), (2)

{snip}

(1) https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000180-b081-d3ee-a392-b19b26750000
(2) https://www.denverpost.com/2022/05/10/john-eastman-cu-boulder-emails/

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/10/eastman-emails-pennsylvania-legislators-biden-00031668

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Hat tip, Popehat

WrongAndBadHat Retweeted

https://twitter.com/Popehat

Law students: Make sure you ask your professors to grade "John Eastman" style.

Link to tweet

[gab13by13]

1. Why isn't DOJ investigating Eastman?

119 days ago the Michigan AG sent a fake elector criminal referral to DOJ. DOJ shouldn't have had to wait for that referral, it should have known about the fake electors months before because some of the fake elector documents were sent to the National Archives. DOJ should have started an investigation back then.

[agingdem]

2. How do you know the DOJ isn't investigating Eastman?

Garland's DOJ doesn't leak..."a source close to the DOJ" means nothing.. when the DOJ wants us to know something they make it public, no fanfare...the J6 committee hearings are set to begin in a few weeks..I suspect (I may be wrong) Garland can't go public with indictments/persons of interest etc., until the hearings conclude because that becomes the "story" rather than peeling the onion of January 6..

[gab13by13]

4. I guarantee you this,

yes, I agree, DOJ doesn't leak, but if Eastman had been summoned before a grand jury we would have heard about it, guaranteed, and not from DOJ, most likely from Eastman himself.

[Lonestarblue]

5. Agree. Unless I missed an announcement, the DOJ has not seated a grand jury fr J6 testimony.

The only grand jury related to Trump is in Georgia. And I would think that Trump’s recorded threat to the Georgia Secretary of State asking him to overturn an election is also a violation of federal law. Crickets there, too.

[gab13by13]

9. Absolutely,

I wish that DOJ had run a parallel investigation in Georgia.

That Fulton county DA has guts. She has needed additional police protection and she bought her prosecutors bullet proof vests, but she is at least investigating Trump.

[Fiendish Thingy]

10. You missed it. GJ was seated in February.

But that information wasn’t released until April because we’re not entitled to information about ongoing investigations.

[agingdem]

16. Thank you...

the DOJ is supposed to operate their investigations (grand juries) in secret..I'm all for "instant gratification isn't quick enough" but when Garland goes public with charges/indictments, I want the evidence tight, unambiguous and incontrovertible, no wiggle room..and I think the J6 hearings are going to give us that..

[gab13by13]

17. If DOJ with its FBI agents, search warrants, thousands of agents and prosecutors,

is waiting for evidence from a Congressional legislative committee, our democracy is screwed.

[Fiendish Thingy]

8. How do you know they aren't?

You’re not entitled to detailed information about ongoing investigations.

[BumRushDaShow]

12. "DOJ should have started an investigation back then. "

DOJ shouldn't have had to wait for that referral, it should have known about the fake electors months before because some of the fake elector documents were sent to the National Archives.

You do realize that "back then", when the falsified documents were submitted by Michigan to NARA on December 14, 2020, 45 was still President, DOJ was still under AG Bill Barr who had not resigned yet, and the two U.S. Attorneys in Michigan appointed by 45 were still there.

[BumRushDaShow]

3. "cite their concerns with Pennsylvania's absentee ballot procedures and then use historical data"

There was NO "historical data" because Act-77, that permitted "no-excuse absentee voting" for the first time, had only been passed and signed into law on Oct. 31, 2019, and after that, there was a SINGLE election (albeit delayed due to COVID-19), a primary that was originally scheduled for April 28, 2020, that was moved to June 2, 2022 because the state had been effectively shut down.

That was it.

Before that under the existing law that had been in effect since 1937, there was generally very little "absentee voting" due to the restrictions (e.g., college students who went to out of town schools, employees working overseas, people who might have had work travel scheduled election day or who were in some medical facility but still wanted to vote, and military serving overseas, etc).

The loons have been trying to now repeal Act-77, which had literal near-unanimous state Assembly support (including the GOP, with only a single (R) and a single (D) who voted against it), which was mainly put forward to "trade" getting rid of straight-party ticketing (so the GOP "benefits" ) in exchange for "no-excuse mail voting" (which benefits Democrats in terms of options for those with difficulty getting to get to their polling locations (including the home bound with not enough to qualify for a "disability" ) and those who have difficulty dealing with the new touchscreen voting machines.

[Baitball Blogger]

6. Use historical data to prorate the totals?!!

What the hell. Seriously, what the hell!!!!

[BumRushDaShow]

15. Am trying to figure out what "historical data" they had on (no-excuse) mail-in voting here in PA

when that process didn't even exist before 2020 and had only been in effect for a SINGLE election before the 2020 general - which was a (delayed due to COVID) primary election in 2020, happening after the law signed into law in October 2019, and only going into effect April 28, 2020.

[Baitball Blogger]

18. Sounds like they weren't even trying to

Follow a process they could rationally justify. It was all about reaching a desired end.

[BumRushDaShow]

19. Exactly

Lots of "assumptions" about this state, its Constitution, and laws. They seem to have manufactured a vision that we had suddenly transformed into "California" and was in need of being loonified.

It should tell you something when a law that was near-unanimously approved by the GOP-controlled state legislature here (with only 2 no votes - one (R) and one (D)), was somehow suddenly the horror of their existence, despite the fact that the entire state House and 1/2 of the state Senate was elected using that very same law, and if they had "overturned the 2020 election", then they would have no longer been in office.

Link to tweet

John Fetterman
@JohnFetterman
The so called “mic-drop” case in Commonwealth Court blocks the certification of the PAGOP’s *own* races.

The term expires on Monday, the 30th.

This mean we wouldn’t have a Legistature to vote on their other “mic drop”: a resolution going nowhere fast.
legis.state.pa.us
Senate Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
9:04 AM · Nov 28, 2020 from Munhall, PA

Link to tweet

John Fetterman
@JohnFetterman
·
Nov 28, 2020
The so called “mic-drop” case in Commonwealth Court blocks the certification of the PAGOP’s *own* races.

The term expires on Monday, the 30th.

This mean we wouldn’t have a Legistature to vote on their other “mic drop”: a resolution going nowhere fast.
legis.state.pa.us
Senate Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
John Fetterman
@JohnFetterman
Oh, and the Governor also certified the Presidential Vote last week so..
9:07 AM · Nov 28, 2020 from Munhall, PA

Link to tweet

John Fetterman
@JohnFetterman
·
Nov 28, 2020
Replying to @JohnFetterman
Oh, and the Governor also certified the Presidential Vote last week so..
John Fetterman
@JohnFetterman
Oh dear.
Image
9:11 AM · Nov 28, 2020 from Whitaker, PA

[Fiendish Thingy]

7. Eastman is going to prison. Nt

[gab13by13]

11. Eastman doesn't seem worried,

he is out in Arizona still trying to overturn the 2020 election.

[Fiendish Thingy]

13. He's worried enough to fight tooth and nail to hide evidence

IMO, His efforts to overturn the election are currently driven by desperation to reinstall Trump so that Trump can pardon him.

Like these emails, The evidence that’s just surfaced in the past few months and been made public is strong evidence for conspiracy to commit fraud, if not seditious conspiracy. We haven’t yet been told what their aides and not-yet-famous colleagues have told the committee or the grand jury.

I think Eastman, Giuliani and Meadows are all on the hook…and the first one to flip will get the best plea deal, while the others face 20 years or more.

I expect the June hearings will be a revelation for us all.

[PSPS]

21. Maybe in fantasy land. He's not going to prison. They're all going to skate.

When I see all the Garland apologists jump in on these threads, I imagine a tableau with a skeleton in a rocking chair with the caption, "Yup! They'll all go to prison real soon now! Yup!"

[mahatmakanejeeves]

14. Adding a link

Eastman Urged PA Officials To Toss Absentee Ballots

[BumRushDaShow]

20. Here is the Denver Post link

https://www.denverpost.com/2022/05/10/john-eastman-cu-boulder-emails/