How Trump Pressed for Tina Peters' Release and What It Has Meant for Colorado

Tina Peters was an election official who, according to Colorado's top election officer, switched off her own surveillance cameras, let an unauthorized man pose as a county employee, and allowed him to copy proprietary software from secure voting equipment. President Trump spent months demanding her freedom, and the way he did it is now the subject of a federal lawsuit filed by Colorado's attorney general.

Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat, laid out the case against Peters. She said Peters ordered the cameras turned off, photographed the voting equipment and shared the images with a network of election deniers. Griswold learned of the breach when copies of the data turned up at a conference devoted to claims of election fraud, where Peters was a speaker. Peters was charged with obstruction for refusing to cooperate with the investigation, then indicted a month later on 10 criminal counts. The indictment raised her standing among election skeptics.

After a two-week trial in 2024, a jury convicted her of three misdemeanors and four felonies. Mesa County District Court Judge Matthew Barrett sentenced her to nearly nine years in prison. "You are no hero," he told her in court, calling her a charlatan and saying he was convinced she would do it all again. He described her as as defiant a defendant as the court had ever seen.

Mr. Trump called Peters a patriot and a "hostage" held by Democrats for political reasons. He issued a pardon that had no legal effect, because her conviction was on state charges, not federal ones. He also attacked Gov. Jared Polis, calling him a "weak and pathetic man" and a "sleazebag governor." Last year, as a wildfire burned in Colorado, he promised "harsh measures" if she was not released.

Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat, says consequences followed. Federal wildfire aid was denied. The administration threatened to withhold food aid from the state's neediest families, canceled $109 million in transportation funding, and moved to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder. The White House calls these independent agency decisions. Spokesperson Lauren Bis said there is no politicization in the president's disaster relief decisions. Weiser's office, which helped convict Peters, is suing the president for what it alleges was a retaliation campaign. "The threats were not hidden, they were not subtle," Weiser said.

In May, after Peters had served less than two years, Polis commuted her sentence. He told 60 Minutes that nearly nine years shocked him, and that she should have received one to three. He called her a nonviolent, elderly, first-time offender and said the move would have been easier had the president never mentioned her. The Colorado County Clerks Association said it was "furious" and "disgusted." Its director, Republican Matt Crane, called the commutation a complete betrayal of the election community and said Polis "bent the knee." Critics also note that the state court system was already reconsidering her sentence. Polis said commutations have no timeline and that once his mind was made up, there was no reason to wait.

Since her release, Peters has returned to the election denial circuit. She attended the Fraud Fighter Summit in Las Vegas, appeared on Alex Jones' streaming show and met Mr. Trump at the White House. In August she told 60 Minutes that the question is whether people can trust voting machines, and that her answer is no. She said turning off the cameras "was not against the law," and did not clearly say whether she will run for office. More than 60 lawsuits alleging fraud in the 2020 election were dismissed or withdrawn, and reviews by federal and state officials, Republicans among them, found no fraud that would have changed the outcome. Crane said the records Peters says were wiped were cleared in a routine statewide update, and her staff had already backed up everything required for retention.

Some federal money has since resumed. A freeze on $47 million for water projects was lifted, and last month the administration approved federal wildfire aid. Griswold and Crane worry about lasting damage. Crane says the president's support for Peters fueled distrust that has made election workers targets of threats and intimidation. Weiser's lawsuit and Peters' next political move are what to watch.