In the Documents: Witnesses for John Eastman’s Disciplinary Trial

As Trump-allied lawyer John Eastman faces charges for engaging in a “criminal enterprise” to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia, his disbarment trial in California is set to resume on Thursday.

Following the 2020 election, Eastman penned a now-infamous memo outlining a six-step scheme for preventing the congressional certification of the election results and keeping former President Trump in power. The plan, which relied on Trump supporters from seven swing states submitting forged electoral certificates to dispute Biden’s victory in those states, is also a key element in the Justice Department’s Aug. 1 indictment of Trump for his efforts to overturn the election, which implicates Eastman as “Co-conspirator 2.” 

Eastman’s role in the attempt to subvert democracy is also the basis for the State Bar of California’s pursuit of sanctions against Eastman — including the potential revocation of Eastman’s law license. 

Several potential witnesses for Eastman in his disciplinary trial, which began June 20, are part of a nationwide network of election deniers who have sought to undermine confidence in U.S. elections in the months and years after the 2020 vote. Through public records requests and litigation, American Oversight previously uncovered communications that several of the potential witnesses had with state leaders and right-wing activists about election and voting-related issues.

Michael Gableman

Michael Gableman, a former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice, led the Wisconsin Assembly’s Office of Special Counsel in carrying out a partisan investigation of the 2020 election. Through litigation and records requests, American Oversight uncovered documents detailing Gableman’s activities in Wisconsin and his communications with election-integrity activists.

Prior to Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos’ selection of Gableman to head the inquiry in the summer of 2021, Gableman had made public statements claiming the 2020 election had been “stolen.” Even as his inquiry went on, finding — as the judge in one of American Oversight’s lawsuits put it — “absolutely no evidence of election fraud,” Gableman continued to imply that the vote had been marred by wrongdoing. In early 2022, during one of his interim reports on his investigation, Gableman had even suggested that the Assembly consider decertifying the election — though just two weeks later, according to records we uncovered, he sent Vos a memo describing decertification as a “practical impossibility.” The memo was sent the same day that Vos had met with Eastman and others who were pushing for decertification.

American Oversight’s full report on our investigation of Gableman’s inquiry is available here. Among the records we uncovered include documents revealing that the cost of OSC’s office space was being partly supplemented by sublease agreements with the conservative Thomas More Society and the Minneapolis law firm Mohrman, Kaardal & Erickson. Erick Kaardal, a partner at that firm, also worked with the Thomas More Society and its Amistad Project, which bills itself as an election integrity group. He represented both groups in lawsuits challenging the 2020 election, and was in close communication with the Wisconsin inquiry.

We also obtained communications pointing to Gableman’s connections to those running the Arizona Senate’s sham election “audit” in 2021, which was led by the firm Cyber Ninjas. On July 23, 2021, right-wing activist Harry Wait emailed Gableman, relaying a message from former Wisconsin Rep. Tim Ramthun’s office: “We’ve got the cyber ninja team on hold, and we can move to get things done if we can get Tim [Ramthun] and Mike [Gableman] talking.” 

On Aug. 1, Christina Bobb, a right-wing media personality and “audit” funder who later joined Trump’s legal team, told Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan: “Gableman was appointed to oversee an audit in WI. He asked to speak with you. He may call you, FYI.” Bobb connected Arizona Senate President Karen Fann to Gableman the same day, writing in a text message, “WI Supreme Court Justice (Retired) has been appointed to oversee an audit in WI. He has asked for your number. Do you mind if I share it with him? His name is Michael Gableman.” Fann replied, “Absolutely.”  

Kurt Olsen

Olsen is a lawyer who was active in Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results and wrote a draft complaint that would have asked the Supreme Court to disqualify electoral votes from six swing states. He also represented Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake in her attempt to challenge her loss in the 2022 race, and was sanctioned for making false statements in court about the election’s legitimacy.

Records we obtained suggest that Olsen may have served as a liaison between Trump and leaders of the Arizona Senate’s “audit” of Maricopa County. In late June 2021, as the review was in full swing, Olsen appears to have been mentioned in an email from Phil Waldron, the retired Army colonel and security consultant closely tied to efforts to overturn the election. Waldron is linked to the firm Allied Security Operations Group, which had written a thoroughly debunked report on 2020 election irregularities in Michigan and was nearly hired by the Arizona Senate to conduct the election review. 

In the email, Waldron told Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan that “Kurt is going to talk to 45 today about $$” and added, “Mike L talking to Corey L,” referring to Trump ally Mike Lindell and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. 

About two weeks later, Waldron asked Logan if he had received “a 1mil [payment] from Corey Lewendowsk” and added that “supposedly Kurt talked to trump and they got 1 mil for you.” Logan said he had never received $1 million “at once” nor had he “received anything directly.” (In January, the Guardian and Documented, using records we uncovered, reported that Trump did indeed make a $1 million payment to “audit” efforts through his PAC.)

Olsen was also listed as a presenter on a July 2021 agenda for a recurring meeting among high-profile election deniers. The group, led by prominent election denier Ivan Raiklin, met regularly to discuss “the election remedy process at the state level.” The invite list for the July meeting included Arizona Rep. Mark Finchem. According to the agenda, Olsen provided updates on Wisconsin along with another Trump-allied lawyer, Jim Troupis. Troupis was also slated to be a witness in the disbarment trial until he was removed from the list by Eastman’s lawyers on June 16.

Douglas Frank

Frank, who was also listed as an invitee for Raiklin’s election meeting, is an associate of election conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell. Frank has traveled around the country to meet with election administrators (including former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters) in an attempt to convince them that Dominion Voting Systems manipulated election results. In September 2022, the FBI seized his phone as part of an investigation of the Colorado security breach.

Records we obtained indicate that Frank worked on election-denial efforts with activists in Montana. In July 2021, Jane Rectenwald, the president of the Montana Election Integrity Project, emailed the Montana House of Representatives about an “investigation into Missoula election fraud.” She wrote that “Dr. Douglas Frank has the Montana data and we are hoping he will provide more detail by county.” She also indicated that election denier Seth Keshel was working on the same project.

We also obtained records from Lycoming County, Pa., indicating that the right-wing Lycoming County Patriots group was in contact with Frank as recently as October 2022 about voting machines.

Ray Blehar, John Droz

Records we’ve obtained link Blehar and Droz to the Arizona “audit.” In April 2021, Doug Logan responded to an offer of assistance from Droz, a North Carolina-based physicist. Droz said that he had “put together a team of independent experts to analyze 2020 election data.” Logan asked Droz if he had access to datasets that list undocumented immigrants with drivers licenses, death records in Arizona, and moving records.

In his response, Droz copied “two of our team members,” Ray Blehar, a Pennsylvania blogger, and Eric Quinnell, who had helped push voter fraud claims in Fulton County, Ga., and Antrim County, Mich., after the 2020 election. The group discussed their election data analyses in a subsequent email chain. 

Logan forwarded his exchange with the trio to Pennsylvania-based activist and “audit” worker Heather Honey. Honey — who had initially been included as a potential witness for Eastman — replied: “I worked with Ray on some issues in PA so I will give him a call and check in on AZ. I do get all of the Droz updates as well.”

Garland Favorito

According to documents we obtained, Georgia-based election-denial activist Garland Favorito was involved in several efforts to undermine confidence in the 2020 election. Records reveal:

• In a February 2021 email from Doug Logan to Karen Fann about his firm conducting the “audit,” he referenced working with Favorito: “We have similar procedures to that ballot inspection plan. … That looks like something I’ve seen Garland Favorito use in GA. We’ve been talking with him as part of this process and coordinating what best practices look like.”
• Favorito invited Logan, Ben Cotton, and others to a February 2022 Zoom meeting regarding “Fulton Anomalies,” likely referring to Fulton County, Ga. He wrote, “We are trying to wrap up preliminary findings this week so that we can present them next week.”
• In a response to a March 2022 question from a reporter about whether the “audit” was marred by procedural errors, Logan suggested that the reporter “ask Garland Favorito about our process. He’s been active in the election space for quite some time.”
• Favorito was also listed as a presenter on the July 2021 “Election Integrity Call” at which Kurt Olsen also spoke.

Joseph Oltmann

Joseph Oltmann is a far-right podcaster. In October 2021, according to records previously held by Cyber Ninjas, an individual asked Doug Logan if he knew Lin Wood, Jarrin Jackson, or Joe Oltmann and whether they “can be trusted.” Logan replied, “I know Joe and Lin. Inclined to trust Joe in most circumstances.”

Other Potential Witnesses Who Were Barred from Testifying

The California bar sought to exclude from testifying a number of individuals whom Eastman tried to include as witnesses, citing procedural violations in court filings. On Aug. 16, the court partially granted the bar’s motion and excluded former Arizona Rep. Mark Finchem, activist Heather Honey, former Wisconsin election clerk Sandy Juno, Arizona Sen. Wendy Rogers, and others from appearing as witnesses in the trial. Others, including Kurt Olsen, whom the bar sought to remove, were permitted to remain as witnesses. Eastman’s original list of witnesses included several individuals, including Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan, whom Eastman later removed himself. 

Arizona Rep. Mark Finchem

In the weeks after the presidential election, Trump allies in Arizona began a hunt for evidence of fraud that would undermine the results — an effort that eventually turned into the discredited “audit.” Finchem, then a member of the Arizona House of Representatives who unsuccessfully ran for Arizona secretary of state in 2022, was closely involved with the Maricopa “audit” and early efforts to decertify the state’s election results. In early December 2020, Finchem shared with his colleagues briefs that contained supposed justifications for decertifying the election, including one that he had authored himself.

Around the same time, Finchem was also in contact with Phil Waldron. On Dec. 8, 2020, Waldron forwarded a document titled “Arizona Report” to Finchem and several Trump-allied lawyers, including Jenna Ellis. In the email, Waldron pitched his services for an audit, writing that he would “identify fraudulent ballots using optimal scanning technology” and “pull invalid votes out of the totals … so that your state can certify normal elections and potentially not have to take extra legislative action.” The proposal — that the state could reach a different election outcome by pulling out “invalid” votes — was similar to a suggestion Eastman made to Pennsylvania Rep. Russ Diamond that same month.

Later in December, the office of U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks — a congressman from Alabama who on Jan. 6 gave an inflammatory speech to Trump supporters near the White House — emailed Finchem, indicating that Brooks’ office was “putting together a master memo on the valid grounds” for objecting to the Electoral College certification. The staffer asked Finchem for a memo detailing “allegations of fraud and other election irregularities” from a Nov. 30 meeting with Rudy Giuliani and conservative state lawmakers in Phoenix. 

We also obtained records, reported on by Politico, indicating that in late 2020, Finchem submitted a request to the DHS Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency for a “full spectrum forensic examination” to “analyze, investigate and report on the Dominion and/or SmartMatic voting systems.” In his request, Finchem suggested that the firm CyTech run the examination. CyTech’s CEO and founder Ben Cotton was later involved in the Arizona “audit,” and CyFIR, an offshoot of CyTech, later subcontracted with lead “audit” contractor Cyber Ninjas. 

Other public records we obtained revealed:

• On Jan. 5, Finchem circulated a letter addressed to Vice President Mike Pence regarding the “reclamation of Electoral College Electors from Arizona,” signed by Finchem, Kelly Townsend, and other Arizona House and Senate members.
• Guardian Defense Fund, a nonprofit associated with Finchem, paid $400,000 for security services for the “audit.”
• Finchem was invited to the recurring “Election Integrity Call” hosted by Ivan Raiklin. 
• Arizona Senate President Karen Fann may have met with Eastman in the weeks after the 2020 election. In a Dec. 13 email response to a constituent who demanded that the election results be decertified, Fann wrote: “With respect to the US Constitution Article 2 and 3 provisions, we spent an hour and a half with a nationally accredited constitutional attorney which was extremely interesting and I learned a lot.” Fann continued, “He stated that the ‘plenary clause’ allowing us to convene ourselves with a simple majority applies ‘when there is no clear winner of an election,’” echoing the legal theory espoused by Eastman in his election-overturning memo.

Heather Honey

Honey is a Pennsylvania-based activist who worked on the Arizona “audit” and was in close communication with Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan, including about similar efforts in Pennsylvania. Honey was originally an employee of audit subcontractor Wake TSI, and stayed on after the firm’s contract with Cyber Ninjas expired. She was routinely copied on operational emails about the “audit,” including in discussions about recruiting ballot counters and other volunteers. 

On June 14, 2021, Honey emailed two Pennsylvania legislators, state Reps. Seth Grove and Russ Diamond, with what appears to be draft language for a bill requiring cybersecurity testing of “all computer systems with access to or from the internet or are otherwise made available to the public.” Honey’s email said that the recommended language was “based on Doug [Logan]’s experience working in this space.” Diamond was also the recipient of the December 2020 email from Eastman about changing the state’s vote totals by throwing out certain ballots. 

On Aug. 9, 2021, Logan texted Honey, asking her if she knew “what an ‘Affidavit for Assistance’ is in PA?” He said, “[It’s] on their subpoena that ‘will go out Monday’” and said he was “helping [the Pennsylvania Senate] with that again.” The texts suggested that Logan appears to have helped Republicans in the Pennsylvania Senate with the subpoena for detailed voter records as part of their attempted statewide “forensic investigation” of the 2020 election. 

In December 2022, Honey testified in court in support of Kari Lake, the Republican candidate for Arizona governor who unsuccessfully challenged the results of the election she lost. 

Arizona Sen. Wendy Rogers

Rogers, a far-right member of the Arizona Senate, was censured last year for threatening violence against her political opponents while at a white nationalist conference. Along with Virginia Sen. Amanda Chase, Rogers established an “election integrity coalition” of like-minded state lawmakers following Mike Lindell’s August 2021 “cyber symposium,” an event that elevated various election conspiracies. As revealed in records obtained by American Oversight, the coalition at least initially consisted of a bi-monthly conference call “to further discuss Election Integrity and continue to move the effort forward.” Meetings appear to have continued through at least December 2021, and emails about the coalition continued to be exchanged through at least March 2022. 

Sandy Juno

Juno is the former county clerk of Brown County, Wis. During a March 2021 hearing held by the State Assembly’s election committee, Juno accused the mayor of Green Bay of election manipulation, but her claims were refuted by the Wisconsin Elections Commission. 

Through American Oversight’s investigation of the Wisconsin Assembly’s partisan inquiry of the 2020 election, we obtained records that connected Juno with those who worked on the sham investigation. In early November 2021, Erick Kaardal — the conservative lawyer who communicated closely with Michael Gableman — connected Juno with Carol Matheis, another lawyer who worked with Gableman. Matheis wrote that she “spoke with [Juno] briefly back in September” and asked her to meet in Green Bay. On Nov. 16, Matheis sent an update to Gableman’s office, writing that she had spoken with Juno “extensively” about an investigation into alleged fraud in Green Bay. 

Juno also appears to have been one of several recipients of updates from conservative lawyer and voting-restriction activist Cleta Mitchell. On Oct. 27, 2022, Mitchell sent to the list an article about Florida opening a criminal probe into alleged “ballot harvesting.” The message appears to have been forwarded to Wisconsin Rep. Janel Brandtjen, with a note from Juno: “FYI- if you see something or hear something – say something!”