By PETER WONG/Oregon Capital Bureau
Rep. Mike Nearman faces two criminal charges in connection with his opening of a door that allowed anti-lockdown protesters to enter a closed Capitol building during a Dec. 21 special session of the Oregon Legislature.
According to filings in Marion County Circuit Court, Nearman, a Republican from a mid-Willamette Valley district, faces one count of first-degree official misconduct and one count of second-degree criminal trespass. Both are misdemeanors; maximum punishments are one year in jail and a $6,250 fine.
Nearman was indicted after Oregon State Police turned over the results of its investigation to the Marion County district attorney.
Prosecutors said that Nearman, “being a public servant, did unlawfully and knowingly perform an act which constituted an unauthorized exercise of his official duties, with intent to obtain a benefit or to harm another.”
Nearman, 57, is a former software engineer in his fourth term from District 23, which stretches over Yamhill, Polk, Marion and Benton counties. He lives outside of Independence, although the city itself is in District 20.
The Capitol has been closed to the public since March 18, 2020, at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. The House and Senate have limited access to floor sessions to members and staff. All committee meetings, including public testimony, have been virtual.
Video surveillance footage that went viral shows Nearman opening a door that allowed anti-lockdown protesters to enter a Capitol vestibule — police eventually ejected them — and re-entering the building from the south side by using an access card. He did walk by the west entrance, but police were gathered inside.
Police rebuffed a second attempt by protesters later to breach the Capitol at the west entrance. Five people were arrested, at least one of them for using a chemical irritant against police, others for shoving news reporters and photographers covering the protest.
A few days after House Speaker Tina Kotek disclosed Nearman’s identity — but not the footage — based on information from State Police, Nearman said this in a statement Jan. 12:
“I do think that when … the Oregon Constitution says that the legislative proceedings shall be ‘open,’ it means open,” he said in a statement. “And as anyone who has spent the last nine months staring at a screen doing virtual meetings will tell you, it’s not the same thing as being open.”
Lawmakers did complete action on the four bills put before the Dec. 21 special session, which ended in one day, without further disruption. The protesters did not reach the House and Senate chambers or the office wings.
Republicans, who are the minority party in both chambers, have pressed for reopening the Capitol. But with at least four people reporting coronavirus infections in the House during the 2021 session — there has been no such reports in the Senate — a reopening appears unlikely in the near future.
A conviction on either misdemeanor count, or both, would not result in Nearman’s automatic expulsion from the Oregon Legislature. Only felony convictions result in automatic ousters from the Legislature, as a result of a 1994 constitutional change.
However, Nearman already has faced actions by Kotek, who stripped Nearman of his committee assignments and fined him $2,000 for the cost of damage to west entry doors by the protesters. Nearman also agreed to surrender the electronic access card that allows him into the Capitol, and must give 24-hour notice before he enters the Capitol. He cannot allow access to unauthorized persons.
Kotek and other also have filed a complaint with the Legislative Equity Office against Nearman. The complaint is pending in the House Committee on Conduct, which is divided equally between majority Democrats and minority Republicans. The committee has not started public proceedings yet, choosing to wait until the criminal investigation was completed.
The committee can recommend a range of penalties, the ultimate one being expulsion from the House, on constitutional grounds of “disruptive behavior.”
Kotek renewed her earlier call for Nearman to resign his seat.
“Rep. Nearman put every person in the Capitol in serious danger and created fear among Capitol staff and legislators,” she said in a tweet. “I called on him to resign in January and renew my call in light of today’s charges.”
The committee did call for expulsion in the recent case of Rep. Diego Hernandez, a three-term Democrat from Portland accused of creating a hostile work environment and sexual harassment. Of the five women who came forward against Hernandez, the committee concluded there was substantial evidence in three cases.