The so-called “legal architect” and co-defendant in Donald Trump’s coup plot says he hasn’t been able to to raise the kind of funds from MAGA land that would protect him from dipping into personal savings to pay his legal bills. Newsweek reports that John Eastman told Julie Kelly on the “Happy Hour with Julie and Liz” podcast that he has only been able to raise enough funds to cover about “a third of what we've already incurred and less than about a sixth or seventh of what we're likely to incur before we're done.”
And while Donald Trump has been tapping into his political campaign fundraising to cover “tens of millions of dollars” in legal fees, poor Eastman is “trying very hard not to completely deplete my wife's retirement fund.” Grab that violin! This is tough stuff for a guy who spent the entire interview trying to defend what virtually all legal experts have described as indefensible and cynical legal theories, which led to an investigation that may end with him being disbarred.
Eastman is busy trying to make other dodgy legal moves. On Monday, his lawyers made a motion for the wheels of justice to move at the speed Eastman prefers. Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter Tamar Hallerman posted the motion that asks the judge to speed up Eastman’s trial by separating Trump’s alleged co-conspirators into two groups in the Georgia election fraud case. The reason? Trump’s continued Secret Service security needs are slowing everything down.
Eastman has maintained his belief that Donald Trump should have legally been allowed to overthrow our government. As recently as August 2023, in an interview with the Claremont Institute’s Board of Directors Chair Tom Klingenstein, Eastman cited the Declaration of Independence as the legal basis for overturning the 2020 election results.
Campaign Action