Alaska House censure of Eastman is symbolic, not significant

The state House censured Republican Rep. David Eastman Wednesday on a 35-1 vote, with Eastman providing the only pro-Eastman vote.

Despite the near unanimous vote, however, let’s admit that a motion to censure is symbolic, not significant. The House refused to take real action against Eastman for belonging to an anti-government militia, but it should at least remove him from the judiciary committee and find a better legislator to fill that seat.

That all Republicans and Democrats voted against Eastman shows that he is persona non grata. This is nothing new. He can’t get anything done because he’s not someone others can work with. He’s proven this over and over again.

The House censured him in 2017 for suggesting that rural women sometimes get pregnant just so they can get a free trip to Anchorage for an abortion.

In a hearing Monday, Eastman said that some people say it is a benefit to society when children are killed by abusers because the state doesn’t have to pay for social services for dead kids.

He kept up this line of questioning for a few minutes.

The Republicans on the committee let Eastman’s comments about the benefits pass without comment, though the two Democrats objected. On Tuesday there was considerable news coverage and social media exchanges about Eastman’s obnoxious behavior.

After the fact Eastman claimed to be making a point about abortion. But he never mentioned abortion. Suzanne Downing, the spokeswoman for the Alaska Republicans, tried to provide political cover by claiming that Eastman is just misunderstood by his critics.

Homer Rep. Sarah Vance, the GOP chair of the judiciary committee, said Eastman is on that committee because she appreciates his “thought process.”

She opposed the censure motion Wednesday, though she voted for it for some reason.

“They got what they wanted. I hope they’re happy,” she told the Alaska Beacon when asked why she voted to censure Eastman. Who is they?

Earlier, she told legislators that there was no need to call out Eastman. She said her mistake during the hearing was not allowing “an opportunity for clarification.”

Nonsense. Eastman had the opportunity to clarify and chose not to take it.

Vance says she should have invited Eastman to say he was not talking about what he said he was talking about and announce that he didn’t mean what he said about the benefits of dead kids. Her suggestion that Eastman’s remarks were “interpreted incorrectly” is absurd.

Anchorage Rep. Andrew Gray was right: “He has brought great shame on this House.”