wrote a letter to the Empire condemning the remarks<\/a>.<\/p>\nDuring floor debate Wednesday, Eastman apologized for his remarks and issued a press release simultaneous to his speech.<\/p>\n
“I’m very sorry that I said them,” he said in an address of about 15 minutes.<\/p>\n
“I do ask for forgiveness from any and every person who has been hurt by what I have said, and I look forward to talking and interacting and meeting with as many of those people that would be willing to meet with me and talk with me,” he added.<\/p>\n
Others in the Legislature said they weren’t convinced that Eastman had actually apologized or was truly sorry for his words.<\/p>\n
“I was looking for that short, specific, sincere apology, and it didn’t happen. It drifted into political messaging,” said Rep. Chuck Kopp, R-Anchorage.<\/p>\n
Kopp and others casting “no” votes said that even though they found Eastman’s comments reprehensible, they don’t want the Legislature to become a regulator of free speech.<\/p>\n
“We risk going down a dangerous road of censuring people for what they think,” said Rep. Dan Saddler, R-Eagle River.<\/p>\n
House Minority Leader Charisse Millett, R-Anchorage, said her vote on the censure was agonizing, but “even if the member from District 10 doesn’t apologize, I forgive him.”<\/p>\n
Wednesday’s action was unprecedented for the Legislature, which has typically worked through its ethics committees and processes.<\/p>\n
According to the Legislature’s reference librarians and the National Conference of State Legislatures, the Alaska House has never censured one of its members before.<\/p>\n
It was the first time the Legislature has censured any lawmaker on its own since 1994, when the Senate censured Sen. George Jacko after an ethics investigation found Jacko abused his office to seek sexual favors from legislative staff.<\/p>\n
In 1997, the House voted to sanction (a lower level of discipline) Rep. Jerry Sanders after he sent a political mailing at government expense, then refused to work with the Legislature’s citizen-led ethics panel.<\/p>\n
Motion to censure Rep. Eastman<\/strong><\/p>\nYeas – 25<\/strong><\/p>\nRep. Matt Claman, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Harriet Drummond, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Bryce Edgmon, R-Dillingham<\/p>\n
Rep. Zach Fansler, D-Bethel<\/p>\n
Rep. Neal Foster, D-Nome<\/p>\n
Rep. Les Gara, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Jason Grenn, I-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. David Guttenberg, D-Fairbanks<\/p>\n
Rep. Delena Johnson, R-Palmer<\/p>\n
Rep. Andy Josephson, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Scott Kawasaki, D-Fairbanks<\/p>\n
Rep. Sam Kito, D-Juneau<\/p>\n
Rep. Gary Knopp, R-Soldotna<\/p>\n
Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, D-Sitka<\/p>\n
Rep. Gabrielle LeDoux, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Dan Ortiz, I-Ketchikan<\/p>\n
Rep. Justin Parish, D-Juneau<\/p>\n
Rep. Paul Seaton, R-Homer<\/p>\n
Rep. Ivy Spohnholz, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak<\/p>\n
Rep. Geran Tarr, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Steve Thompson, R-Fairbanks<\/p>\n
Rep. Chris Tuck, D-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Dean Westlake, D-Kotzebue<\/p>\n
Rep. Adam Wool, D-Fairbanks<\/p>\n
Nays – 14<\/strong><\/p>\nRep. Chris Birch, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. David Eastman, R-Wasilla<\/p>\n
Rep. Jennifer Johnston, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Chuck Kopp, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Charisse Millett, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. Mark Neuman, R-Big Lake<\/p>\n
Rep. Lance Pruitt, R-Anchorage<\/p>\n
Rep. George Rauscher, R-Palmer<\/p>\n
Rep. Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River<\/p>\n
Rep. Dan Sadler, R-Eagle River<\/p>\n
Rep. Colleen Sullivan-Leonard, R-Wasilla<\/p>\n
Rep. Dave Talerico, R-Healy<\/p>\n
Rep. Cathy Tilton, R-Wasilla<\/p>\n
Rep. Tammie Wilson, R-North Pole<\/p>\n
Excused – 1<\/strong><\/p>\nRep. Mike Chenault, R-Nikiski<\/p>\n
\nContact reporter James Brooks at james.k.brooks@juneauempire.com or call 419-7732.<\/b><\/p>\n
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The Alaska House of Representatives on Wednesday voted to censure Rep. David Eastman, R-Wasilla, for his recent comments claiming that some rural Alaska women become deliberately pregnant, and others delay abortions so they can get a “free to trip to Seattle” with Medicaid funds. The 25-14 vote, brought by Rep. Ivy Spohnholz, D-Anchorage, means little […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":426,"featured_media":27918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[34],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-27917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-alaska-legislature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/426"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27917"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=27917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}