David Eastman (politician)

Despite several attempts to disqualify him from eligibility for elected office, on August 16, 2022, Eastman received 52.25% of the vote in the ranked choice open primary election for the 27th Alaska House District (Eastman's new district after Alaska redistricting went into effect).

As a consequence of his membership, on January 31, 2022, five members of the seven-member Committees on Committees, two Republicans, two Democrats and an Independent, all members of the House majority coalition, voted to remove Eastman from his membership on some committees. In December 2022, following his re-election to the Alaska House, a lawsuit was filed barring Eastman from serving in the House. The suit alleged that his membership in the Oath Keepers and the group's role in the January 6 United States Capitol attack ran afoul of a disloyalty clause in the Alaskan Constitution. The initial court ruling found that Eastman was not disqualified on First Amendment grounds because he did not himself actively participate in the Oath Keepers' attempt to overthrow the U.S. government.

During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Eastman was the sole vote in the Alaska House of Representatives against a non-binding resolution to supply military aid to Ukraine.

In late September 2021, following a hack of the group's internal data, it was revealed that Eastman's name was among the some 38,000 people whose names appear on a lifetime membership roster of the Oath Keepers; a far-right militia organization. Records show that Eastman is a lifetime member of the Oath Keepers, as reported by BuzzFeed News and other organizations.

Eastman traveled to Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021, to protest the Electoral College vote count which confirmed Joe Biden's victory, and to see Trump speak at the "Stop the Steal" rally. He spoke to Alaska Public Radio as he walked from the rally to the Capitol and was photographed a few hundred feet from the Capitol building. He later described the storming of the Capitol building as "pretty terrible." The next day he promoted false claims that the attack on the Capitol was the work of antifa.

On November 11, 2021, sixty-nine local and other graduates of West Point, New York wrote a letter published in Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, Eastman's local paper, to demand that he resign from the legislature since, though he had stressed his military credentials and training at the United States Military Academy, he had dishonored the ideals of The Long Gray Line, that is, those who had matriculated at the USMA.

In June 2021, Eastman traveled to Arizona to observe the 2021 Maricopa County presidential ballot audit ordered by the Arizona state senate.

In 2020, he was removed from his position on the ethics committee after it was found that he violated the state ethics law in 2018 by disclosing confidential information.

Following Donald Trump's loss in the 2020 United States presidential election, Eastman posted on his website that, "The election process that has been observed thus far by the American people has been abused to such a degree that, in my view, it can no longer be called an election. To call what the American people have observed 'an election', under the United States Constitution, would be fundamentally dishonest."

Eastman is against abortion in all forms. He tried to add a right-to-life amendment to a non-controversial resolution in 2017 that designated April as Sexual Assault Awareness Month, and filed a complaint when the committee wouldn't consider his amendment.

In May 2017, Eastman was involved in a controversy regarding his remarks suggesting that native Alaskan women in villages try to get pregnant on purpose to get a "free trip to the city" for abortion. He claims there are too many "incentives" to get an abortion and said, "We have folks who try to get pregnant in this state so that they can get a free trip to the city, and we have folks who want to carry their baby past the point of being able to have an abortion in this state so that they can have a free trip to Seattle." He provided no evidence for these statements, but asserted, "a number of people have come to (his) office with stories, experiences." The Alaska House of Representatives voted to censure Eastman because of his remarks.

In April 2017, Eastman voted against a bill to honor Hmong veterans and the more than 100,000 Hmong people who died in the Vietnam War supporting the United States. He also voted against a bill honoring black soldiers who worked on the Alaska Highway. He has also opposed the recognition of Black History Month.

Eastman was selected in April 2012 by Republicans in House District 13 as their first choice to fill the Alaska state House Seat left vacant by the death of Rep. Carl Gatto. He was selected as an Abraham Lincoln Fellow by the Claremont Institute.

Eastman was born in Redwood City, California and grew up in Orange County. He was both homeschooled and attended private school before attending West Point. After graduating West Point, Eastman joined the United States Army where he was part of the military police, moving to Alaska in 2003. He left active duty in 2009.

David Clark Eastman (born June 1, 1981) is a Republican member of the Alaska House of Representatives, serving the 10th district. He has served since January 17, 2017.