Alaska House Republicans have removed Rep. David Eastman from their caucus, citing tensions with the controversial Wasilla Republican that have built up over time.
The decision comes with less than three weeks left in the legislative session that began in January.
“I think it’ll help us be more productive as a caucus. Just sometimes, his demeanor gets in the way of trying to be productive,” Anchorage Republican Laddie Shaw said in an interview with the Anchorage Daily News.
“They finally said, ‘Enough’s enough,’” said Shaw, noting that freshman members of the caucus were instrumental in the decision to remove Eastman.
Eastman was removed from the House Rules Committee and an ethics committee but will keep other committee assignments, said House Speaker Louise Stutes. That decision was ratified Friday morning by the House Committee on Committees, and the full House confirmed the decision in a 36-2 vote later in the morning.
Opposing the vote were Eastman and his Wasilla Republican colleague, Rep. Christopher Kurka, who is running for governor.
Minority Leader Cathy Tilton said informal polling of her caucus’ members showed more than two-thirds agreed to Eastman’s removal. The caucus had 18 members before his removal.
Tilton said his actions have “caused disruption and threaten the cohesion of the caucus.”
Eastman’s style has at times alienated and frustrated members of his own party, some of whom said his unpredictability had cost Republicans a shot at organizing a majority to control the House in 2019 and 2020 and campaigned for his Republican primary challenger in 2020.
Eastman’s removal came on the heels of a resolution passed by the Alaska Republican Party during its convention in Fairbanks on April 23 to rebuke the Foundation for Applied Conservative Leadership. Eastman is an active member of the organization, which seeks to pressure Republican lawmakers to vote in certain ways. The group had attacked Big Lake Rep. Kevin McCabe after he tabled several budget amendments proposed by Eastman.
The foundation, known as FACL, is “part of what is causing the divisiveness in the Republican Party and in the Legislature right now,” said McCabe, who introduced the resolution at the party convention and said he has been targeted by FACL for his votes.
“I think that the Republicans need to do all they can to unite the party instead of what we call the circular firing squad,” McCabe added.
Eastman’s removal comes after years of altercations with fellow lawmakers. In 2017, he was formally reprimanded by the House after claiming that women in rural villages try to get pregnant so they can get a free trip to a city for an abortion.
In 2020, the minority suspended him from legislative committees and placed him on “probation” after conflicts with fellow Republicans. Earlier this year, the House considered taking action to punish Eastman for his membership in the far-right Oath Keepers, whose leaders were charged with seditious conspiracy in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
“I think the message that sends to the public is a terrible one and it (sets) a terrible precedent,” Eastman said Friday, shortly before the vote in the House.
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