Ari Melber Grills John Eastman’s Attorney: ‘It’s a Very Easy Question To Answer’

MSNBC’s Ari Melber grilled an attorney for John Eastman about basic facts surrounding the 2020 election.

Eastman was the architect of a scheme to keep Donald Trump in power after the latter lost the contest. He falsely insisted that as presiding officer over the certification of the election, then-Vice President Mike Pence had the authority to refuse to acknowledge the results. Instead, Eastman argued, Pence could send the matter back to states Trump lost, so that the Republican-controlled legislatures there could designate pro-Trump electors as the valid ones.

Appearing on Monday’s edition of The Beat, Charles Burnham insisted his client – who is an unindicted co-conspirator in the prosecution of Trump for his attempt to overturn the election – has done nothing illegal.

Melber began the interview with a straightforward question.

“First and foremost, Donald Trump lost the 2020 election,” the host stated. “You accept that fact?”

Here’s how the exchange went:

BURNHAM: Well, look. There’s a large portion of the country that has issues with the 2020 election. There are still discussions about things that went on–

MELBER: A large portion of the country believes in ghosts or horoscopes. I’m asking you, do you accept the results of the election that Donald Trump lost?

BURNHAM: Well, I’m just here as an attorney representing a client, but I think the important thing is–

MELBER: And I’ll keep moving and I wanna give you the opportunity to answer it. It’s a very easy question to answer. If you can’t answer it, I’ve got other questions.

BURNHAM: Well, my personal opinions are rather– neither here nor there. They’re no better than anybody else’s. But I would like the opportunity to address the latest news and anything your viewers would be interested in.

MELBER: We will definitely get to that. I just wanna get to a couple of these sort of straightforward premise questions. The Electoral College also voted to lock in Biden’s win and Trump’s loss. That was December 14th, 2020. Do you accept that as the valid final step that the Electoral College took?

BURNHAM: Well, again, I’m here as an attorney representing a client. My opinions are no better than yours or anybody else’s. I think really the point I’d like to make, if there’s one takeaway here on behalf of my client – Dr. Eastman – his main focus throughout his activities in 2020 was focusing on specifically on illegalities in the election, which is a related concept to fraud.

MELBER: His view of the underlying issues. We will get to that. But again, I want to lay down some of the basics. Some of these questions people can or can’t answer. Was it wrong for those Trump fans and now convicted seditionists to storm the Capitol and attack police on January 6th?

BURNHAM: Oh, my gosh, certainly. Criminal activity at the United States Capitol or anywhere else is wrong. That should be an obvious fact.

Watch above via MSNBC.

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