Former county clerk Tina Peters sentenced to 9 years for voting-system breach

Tina Peters, a former election official in Colorado’s Mesa County who promoted former President Donald Trump’s election conspiracy theories and was responsible for a breach of voting-system security, was sentenced today to nine years in prison.

“Your lies are well-documented and these convictions are serious,” 21st Judicial District Judge Matthew Barrett told Peters, according to The Colorado Sun. “I am convinced you would do it all over again. You are as defiant a defendant as this court has ever seen.” Barrett said that “prison is the only place” for Peters.

“You are no hero,” Barrett also said, according to Colorado Public Radio. “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.”

Peters reportedly will serve 60 days to six months in the Mesa County jail and then be transferred to the state Department of Corrections. “Peters was handcuffed and taken to jail immediately after she was sentenced,” the Sun wrote.

Peters “compromised her own election equipment”
On August 12, “Peters was convicted of three counts of attempting to influence a public servant, one count of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty, and failing to comply with the secretary of state,” the Associated Press wrote at the time.

After the conviction, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said that “Tina Peters willfully compromised her own election equipment trying to prove Trump’s big lie. She has been found guilty by a jury of her peers and will now face the consequences of her actions.”

In October 2021, Peters was barred from supervising elections due to the leak of voting-system BIOS passwords to QAnon conspiracy theorist Ron Watkins. At the time, Mesa County District Court Judge Valerie Robison detailed how Peters brought a man into a meeting on a “trusted build” software update that is meant to ensure a secure chain of custody for the voting system.