Judge rules ex-Trump lawyer John East­man should be dis­barred over efforts to over­turn 2020 elec­tion

A judge ruled that for­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s lawyer John East­man should be dis­barred for his attempts to over­turn the 2020 elec­tion.
State Bar Court of Cal­i­for­nia Judge Yvette Roland announced her rul­ing Wednes­day. The for­mer Trump lawyer is fac­ing 11 dis­ci­pli­nary charges in California’s bar court.

Attor­ney John East­man, the archi­tect of a legal strat­e­gy aimed at keep­ing for­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump in pow­er, talks to reporters after a hear­ing in Los Ange­les, June 20, 2023. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)

“In view of the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing Eastman’s mis­con­duct and bal­anc­ing the aggra­va­tion and mit­i­ga­tion, the court rec­om­mends that East­man be dis­barred,” Roland wrote in her deci­sion. The rec­om­men­da­tion will now go to the Cal­i­for­nia Supreme Court for a final rul­ing.
Roland’s rul­ing marks a defeat for East­man, though she did side with him on one of his 11 counts. 
The state bar accused East­man of moral turpi­tude over a speech he gave on Jan. 6 at the Ellipse out­side the White House, tying it to the riot lat­er in the day, but the judge dis­missed the count after hold­ing the bar “pre­sent­ed no evi­dence to show that Eastman’s state­ments con­tributed to the assault on the Capi­tol.”
In ear­ly Novem­ber, Roland found East­man cul­pa­ble for mul­ti­ple ethics vio­la­tions, a ten­ta­tive rul­ing that gave the Office of Chief Tri­al Coun­sel more time to con­sid­er fur­ther evi­dence that could have strength­ened their argu­ment for a harsh­er pun­ish­ment.
East­man, a for­mer Chap­man Uni­ver­si­ty law school dean, faced 11 counts of eth­i­cal and legal vio­la­tions for his post-2020 elec­tion activ­i­ties ahead of the Jan. 6 Capi­tol attack. He and Trump, along with 17 oth­ers, were also charged in Geor­gia over an alleged plot to over­turn the elec­tion results in August last year.
The lawyer and con­sti­tu­tion­al law pro­fes­sor defend­ed him­self against the eth­i­cal vio­la­tions by say­ing he was advis­ing then-Pres­i­dent Trump as a client, advice that includ­ed sug­gest­ing to then-Vice Pres­i­dent Mike Pence that the elec­toral count be sus­pend­ed so state leg­is­la­tures could inves­ti­gate alleged ille­gal­i­ties or elec­tion irreg­u­lar­i­ties, con­cerns he said were “well-ground­ed in fact and any­thing but friv­o­lous.” No evi­dence of elec­tion inter­fer­ence on a large scale has been found.
Eastman’s tri­al in Cal­i­for­nia began in …