President Donald Trump issued a full, complete and unconditional pardon for anti-LGBTQ+ lawyer John Eastman and others who aided Trumps attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential elections. Eastman, who served as chairman of the board for the anti-LGBTQ+ group the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), was never charged with a federal crime for his role in Trumps attempt, but Trumps pardon pre-emptively prevents any future prosecutors from pressing federal charges against his co-conspirators.Trumps undated pardon, reported on by numerous media outlets over the weekend, named Eastman as one of five who tried to overturn Trumps 2020 election losses in seven key swing states using a proposed slate of alternate presidential electors willing to vote for him in the Electoral College. The other pardoned co-conspirators include Eastman and fellow attorney Kenneth Chesebro; Trumps chief of staff from his first term, Mark Meadows; longtime Trump adviser Boris Epshteyn; conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell; and dozens of Republican activists who faced state charges for signing paperwork falsely claiming to be legitimate presidential electors,Politicoreported. The president is unable to pardon people charged with state-level crimes. Related Donald Trumps lies are just getting more blatant. Here are the worst. Though the proposed alternate electors had no legal authority to claim themselves as 2020 Electoral College voters, Eastmans drafted strategy said that their votes wouldve allowed Trump to claim hed won more electoral votes than the actual winner, Joe Biden. This would have left Trumps then-Vice President Mike Pence free to allow the Republican-controlled House chamber to declare Trump as the winner through a majority vote, effectively overturning the will of the over 81 million Americans who voted for Biden.The main thing here is that Pence should do this without asking for permission either from a vote of the joint session or from the Court, Eastman wrote in his memo suggesting his plan to overturn the election, which was revealed amid a 2023 indictment accusing him and his aforementioned co-conspirators. The fact is that the Constitution assigns this power to the Vice President as the ultimate arbiter. We should take all of our actions with that in mind. Insights for the LGBTQ+ community Subscribe to our briefing for insights into how politics impacts the LGBTQ+ community and more. Subscribe to our Newsletter today Eastman reportedly sent the memo to Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani with the hopes that both men could convince Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) of widespread election fraud, according toPeril, a 2021 non-fiction recounting of the last days of Trumps presidency written byWashington Postjournalists Bob Woodward and Robert Costa. However, both Lee and Graham rejected Eastmans plan.Trump reportedly told Pence, You really need to listen to John. Hes a respected constitutional scholar. Hear him out. But Pence decided against following Eastmans plan after consulting with the Senate parliamentarian. The parliamentarian, whose role is to interpret Senate rules and procedures, told Pence that he had no authority to certify the elections results beyond counting the votes in the chamber on January 6.Woodward and Costa wrote in their book, Lees head was spinning. No such procedure existed in the Constitution, any law, or past practice. Eastman had apparently drawn it out of thin air.The aforementioned 45-page indictment from 2023 alleged that Eastman had also called Arizona State House Speaker Russell Bowers (R) to decertify the states legitimate electors for Biden and let the courts sort it out. Bowers refused. Eastman also spoke at the January 6, 2021, Stop the Steal rally alongside Trump, Trumps attorney Rudy Giuliani, and others. At the rally, Eastman falsely said, We know there was fraud. We know that dead people voted. Anybody that is not willing to stand up to [declare Trump as the winner] does not deserve to be in the office. It is that simple.After the rally, Trumps followers rioted at the U.S. Capitol. Five people died because of the insurrection, and roughly 140 police officers were injured. The injuries included a broken spine, a lost eye, lost fingers, brain damage, and multiple cases of PTSD. While ransacking the Capitol, the rioters chanted Hang Mike Pence, shattered windows while trying to access congressional chambers, smeared feces in a hallway, and stole computer equipment, potentially constituting a national security breach.For years, NOM campaigned against any expansion of LGBTQ+ civil rights, particularly same-sex marriage. The group was instrumental in helping pass state-level marriage equality bans, pushed for a national constitutional ban, and helped orchestrate the victory of Californias 2008 Proposition 8, which invalidated thousands of same-sex marriages statewide. Eastman became NOMs board chairman in 2011 and compared marriage equality to slavery in 2014, saying that courts had illegitimately decided on the issue and that voters should decide instead. He also tried to get NOM to defend several states same-sex marriage bans in courts, though a federal judge ruled that NOM lacked the legal standing to do so.He has supported Ugandas criminalization of homosexuality, called homosexuality an indicator of barbarism, called same-sex marriage evil and despotic, and claimed that the LGBTQ+ equality movement promotes pedophilia,according to Right Wing Watch.Subscribe to theLGBTQ Nation newsletterand be the first to know about the latest headlines shaping LGBTQ+ communities worldwide.