DENVER (AP) — A Colorado appeals court ruled Thursday that a former county clerk convicted in a scheme that attempted to find proof of fraud in the 2020 presidential election should be resentenced.
Tina Peters is serving a nine-year prison term after being convicted of state crimes for sneaking in an outside computer expert to make a copy of her county’s election computer system during a software update in 2021. A photo and video of confidential voting system passwords were later posted on social media and a conservative website.
Judges on the Colorado Court of Appeals upheld her conviction, but said that a judge should not have considered Peters’ continued promotion of election fraud conspiracies when he sentenced her in 2024. The court sent Peters’ case back to a lower court for a judge to issue a new sentence.
Calls for Peters’ release have become a cause celebre in the election conspiracy movement. President Donald Trump has sought unsuccessfully to pardon Peters and pressured Colorado to set her free.
Peters was unapologetic when she was sentenced by Judge Matthew Barrett and insisted that she tried to unearth what she believed was fraud for the greater good. He ripped into her, calling her a “charlatan” who had used her position to “peddle snake oil.”
