Mesa County Clerk and Colorado Republican candidate for secretary of state Tina Peters reacts to early election returns during a primary night watch party at the Wide Open Saloon on June 28, 2022 in Sedalia, Colorado.
Marc Piscotty | Getty Images
Tina Peters, a former Colorado Republican county clerk who espoused the false conspiracy theory that former President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election due to ballot fraud, was sentenced Thursday to nine years in prison for crimes related to a breach of her county’s voting system.
“You are no hero,” state District Court Judge Matthew Barrett told Peters. “You’re a charlatan who used and is still using your prior position in office to peddle a snake oil that’s been proven to be junk time and time again.”
“Your lies are well documented, and these convictions are serious. I’m convinced you’d do it all over again if you could,” Barrett told the 68-year-old former Mesa County clerk, who was accused of using another person’s security badge to allow someone else to gain access to her county’s election system.
The person who used that badge was affiliated with Mike Lindell, the CEO of My Pillow and a leading proponent of the claim that Trump’s defeat for a second term was due to ballot fraud.
“You’re as defiant a defendant as this court has ever seen,” Barrett told Peters.
Peters, who had requested probation, told the judge before being sentenced, “I’ve never done anything with malice to break the law. I’ve only wanted to serve the people of Mesa County.”
Tina Peters, former Mesa County, Colo., clerk, listens during her trial, Friday, March 3, 2023, in Grand Junction, Colo.
Scott Crabtree | AP
Mesa County District Attorney Daniel Rubenstein told Barrett that, “Ms. Peters has demonstrated repeatedly that she does not think she did anything wrong.”
“She submitted a statement to the court in the pre-sentence investigation report, giving excuses, giving justifications, but never once acknowledging that she did something wrong, that this was not the way to handle this,” Rubenstein said.
“What does every 12-step program start with? It starts with acknowledging you have a problem, and she has not done that, and there’s no purpose in rehabilitation for somebody who does not think they did anything wrong.”
Peters was immediately taken into custody after Barrett rejected her lawyer’s request that she remain free.
Peters was convicted by a trial jury in August of seven criminal counts, including attempt to influence a public servant, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, violation of duty, and failure to comply with secretary of state requirements.
Former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally at the Ryder Center for Health and Physical Education at Saginaw Valley State University in Saginaw, Michigan, October 3, 2024.
Jim Watson | AFP | Getty Images
Before she was sentenced, Colorado County Clerks Association director Matt Crane told Barrett that Peters’ false allegation “in a real and specific way … have led directly to death threats and general threats to the lives and the families of the people who work in our elections.”
“She has willingly aided individuals in our country who believe that violence is a way to make a point,” Crane said. “She has knowingly fueled a fire within others who choose threats as a means to get their way.”
Shortly after Peters was sentenced, the Republican presidential nominee Trump told attendees at a campaign rally in Michigan that in the 2020 election, “We won, we won, we did win.”
“It was a rigged election,” Trump said.
“That’s why I’m doing it again. If I thought I lost I wouldn’t be doing this again,” said Trump, who is facing Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, in this year’s presidential race.
Trump is being criminally prosecuted in federal court in Washington, D.C., and in state court in Atlanta, with charges related to his efforts to undo President Joe Biden’s victory over him in the 2020 election.