(The Center Square) – President Donald Trump is once again calling for the release of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who is in a Colorado prison for her role in tampering with election equipment following the 2020 election.
On Monday, Trump briefly addressed the issue during a press conference on illegal immigrants and drug trafficking.
“The governor of Colorado is a weak and pathetic man who was run by Tren de Aragua,” Trump said. “The criminals from Venezuela took over sections of Colorado. And he was afraid to do anything, but he puts Tina in jail for nine years because she caught people cheating.”
Additionally, Trump said Polis would not “allow our wonderful Tina to come out of a jail – and a high-intensity jail.”
Peters, a 70-year-old former Republican clerk in western Colorado, was found guilty last fall by a jury trial on seven charges related to election integrity, including three counts of attempting to influence a public official. Four of those counts were felonies, three were misdemeanors, and Peters was acquitted on three other charges.
According to the charges, in the months after the 2020 election, Peters allowed an unauthorized person access to the county’s electronic voting machines and take images of server hard drives.
Trump has long called out Colorado officials for the charges against Peters, who is now one year into a nine year sentence. In May, he directed the U.S. Department of Justice “to help secure the release” of Peters, who he said was prosecuted “for political reasons.”
“Colorado must end this unjust incarceration of an innocent American,” Trump said, as previously reported by The Center Square. “FREE TINA PETERS, NOW!”
Democrats have expressed concern with this sentiment from the president.
“Nobody is above the law,” said the Colorado Democratic Party. “Not even Trump’s friends.”
Last week, the president said he would grant Peters a “full pardon.” This is an unprecedented announcement as Peters was convicted of state crimes, not federal.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser called this a pardon “attempt.”
“One of the most basic principles of our constitution is that states have independent sovereignty and manage our own criminal justice systems without interference from the federal government,” Weiser said. “The idea that a president could pardon someone tried and convicted in state court has no precedent in American law, would be an outrageous departure from what our constitution requires, and will not hold up.”
Peters remains in Colorado custody.
