How a disgraced California law professor helped Kamala Harris before plotting Trump’s coup

Before John Eastman failed to carry out his wild plan to help Donald Trump steal the presidency from Joe Biden, and before a federal judge called Eastman’s efforts on Trump’s behalf “a coup in search of a legal theory,” he was a serious candidate for California Attorney General in 2010.

I was an editorial writer for The Sacramento Bee then, and Eastman was getting ready to challenge Kamala Harris, whose future as vice president under Biden would have also been invalidated if Eastman’s plot to delay certifying Biden’s electoral win had been successful.

Looking back, Eastman’s bid for attorney general was a harbinger for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.

It’s no small irony that Eastman helped pave the way for Harris’ victory in the 2010 campaign by damaging the leading Republican in that race, former Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley, and for creating an effective election smear against Cooley that Harris appropriated for her own use.

The rest is history: Harris became attorney general and used that office as a stepping stone to winning a U.S. Senate seat — and, eventually, the vice presidency.

Eastman ran for state office in the year of the tea party, when a Republican wave swept the nation and as California was struggling to emerge from the Great Recession. Municipal governments teetered on bankruptcy, and voters focused on public employee pensions. Eastman ripped Cooley for acknowledging that. If he won, he would collect a pension for his three decades of service to LA County, while also accepting the attorney general’s salary.

Eastman might even have won the Republican nomination if he had raised more money and persuaded a third Republican candidate, a state senator, to step aside. But he did force Cooley to spend $1.5 million. That left Cooley’s campaign all but broke as he entered the general election. Harris then borrowed Eastman’s double-dipping charge against Cooley and pummeled him with it in withering attack ads.

Eastman is a footnote in California politics, but he fell into Trump’s orbit and repeatedly espoused the bogus legal theory that Vice President Mike Pence could alter the election outcome and that there was voter fraud. Former White House lawyer Eric Herschmann, citing Eastman’s actions, told congressional investigators that he spoke to Eastman on Jan. 7, 2021, and advised Eastman to “get a great effing criminal defense lawyer; you’re going to need it.”

U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter wrote that “If Dr. Eastman and President Trump’s plan had worked, it would have permanently ended the peaceful transition of power, undermining American democracy and the Constitution.” Carter wrote this in March when he ordered that Eastman’s Trump-related emails be turned over to congressional investigators.

Meanwhile, Eastman’s old attorney general campaign finance reports foreshadowed his life enmeshed in Trump’s world.

In March 2010, Virginia Thomas — better known as Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas — donated $500 to Eastman. A Trump acolyte, she tried hard to keep Trump in office, including by pressuring 29 Republican Arizona state legislators to reject Joe Biden’s victory, The Washington Post reported.

U.S Senator Ted Cruz was a Texas lawyer in May 2010 when he donated $1,000 to Eastman’s campaign.

Leonard Leo, the founder of the conservative Federalist Society, gave Eastman’s campaign $500, as did other Federalist Society members. Trump relied on Federalist Society-approved lists to appoint judges and Supreme Court justices.

As part of The Bee’s endorsement process in 2010, I helped interview Eastman, then a professor at Chapman law school in Orange County. He made clear that, given an opportunity, he would argue against Obamacare, abortion rights, many of the state’s gun safety laws, and in favor of Proposition 8, the initiative approved in 2008 that banned same-sex marriage.

Eastman was clearly out of step with California public opinion. We endorsed Cooley.

In the months since Jan. 6, 2021, Eastman has separated from Chapman and has been fending off investigations, including one by the State Bar that could cost him his license. In some quarters, however, his views evidently still carry weight. He remains on the board of directors of the Claremont Institute, a so-called think tank that has some influence among conservatives.

On behalf of an arm of the Claremont Institute, Eastman filed a friend of the court brief at the Supreme Court arguing against New York’s law restricting gun owners’ privilege to carry concealed firearms. If the court strikes down the New York law, the decision will almost certainly threaten California’s long-standing law.

Eastman also filed a brief for the Claremont Institute urging the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In taking that stand, he joined dozens of anti-abortion lawyers and organizations. That crowd includes 24 Republican attorneys general led by Texas’ Ken Paxton.

Arguing on behalf of a conservative organization is one thing. Just imagine the clout Eastman would have had if he had caught a few breaks, raised a little more money, and became California attorney general.