John Eastman (left) gets out of an SUV to talk to reporters after a hearing in Los Angeles, Tuesday, June 20, 2023. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong). Right: Eastman speaks at the so-called “Stop the Steal” rally in support of Donald Trump on Jan. 6, 2021 (Screengrab via YouTube)
Former Chapman University School of Law dean John Eastman, the prime proponent of fake elector legal brinksmanship to keep Donald Trump in power after the 2020 election, began his opposition to the state’s proposed RICO trial date by taking a dig at the former president.
Eastman, a former clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas who faces possible disbarment and criminal charges in Georgia over his “coup memo” lawyering in the aftermath of the 45th president’s election loss to President Joe Biden, proposed splitting up the remaining RICO defendants into two groups for two trials — leaving Trump to stand trial alone in a third televised and livestreamed proceeding.
Following several guilty pleas, a number of them high-profile, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) earlier in November asked Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee to schedule a plea deal deadline for June 21, 2024, and trial of the remaining RICO defendants for Aug. 5, 2024.
“This proposed trial date balances potential delays from Defendant Trump’s other criminal trials in sister sovereigns and the other Defendants’ constitutional speedy trial rights,” Willis said.
Attorney and retired law professor Eastman, calling Willis’ guilty plea deadline “arbitrary and capricious” and seeking a hearing on the trial date issue, countered that the “Final Plea date” should be earlier in 2024.
Why? “[S]o that Defendants who do not have lifetime United States Secret Service protection and who are not running for election to an office can exercise and have their right to a jury trial completed within 2024.”
Eastman proposed that Judge McAfee split up or sever the remaining RICO defendants, sans Trump, into two groups of eight or fewer.
“Establishing a ‘Final Plea date’ earlier in 2024 and severing the Defendants into two groups would provide more than enough time for the Court to try two trials each of eight on [sic] fewer defendants, absent former president Trump who at the present may be said to be the presumptive Republican nominee for the office of President of the United States,” Eastman’s opposition said.
In the next line, Eastman asserted that Trump’s U.S. Secret Service protection will only bog proceedings down, so it would be wise to put the former president on trial alone.
“Without Defendant Trump in the courtroom the U.S. Secret Service will not be involved in providing enhanced security, and the trials will proceed faster,” the filing concluded.
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