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Tina Peters (politician)

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Tina Peters (age 66 in 2022[1]) is Mesa County, Colorado's County Clerk and Recorder, and was noted in regional, national, and international news during 2020-22 for having a role in elections yet asserting election fraud. She is "one of at least twenty-two election deniers vying [in 2022] to take charge of elections in eighteen states."[2]

Subsequent to the 2020 U.S. presidential elections Peters permitted access to voting machines to an outsider. She was indicted in 2021 "on charges that she allowed someone to improperly access and download data from election machines as she sought to prove that widespread fraud had occurred in the state’s 2020 presidential election," and she was barred from supervising local elections in 2021 and 2022.[3] She was "the first elections official to face criminal charges related to conspiracy theories surrounding the 2020 election, experts said. She is accused not of fixing the election but of breaking the law as she sought to investigate whether someone else did."[4]

She was a 2022 candidate for Colorado Secretary of State in Republican primary election which concluded Tuesday, June 28. She lost the election.[5][3][6][7][8]She finished third of three candidates and, at least immediately following the release of result, suggested election fraud and did not accept the result. National and international news featured Peters in coverage of US election deniers running for positions of management or influence in conduct of future elections.

Her current position with Mesa County is her first elected office held. She campaigned with a platform that called for improvement in service from Colorado state Department of Motor Vehicles offices.[9]

Mike Lindell introducing Sean Smith, Tina Peters and Sherrona Bishop at Lindell's Cyber Symposium. Peters' face is obscured.

Peters has been in national news relating to her view on possibility of election fraud in the 2020 US presidential election, and with respect to an instance in which subsequent access to Mesa County voting machines was given. She was in Sioux Falls, South Dakota speaking at Mike Lindell's Cyber Symposium on Aug. 10, 2021, at around the same time that investigators from the Colorado Secretary of State's office were investigating how Ron Watkins obtained images from the Mesa County voting system.[10][11]

Lindell also provided a residence for Peters to escape from public view for a period.

She has been barred from overseeing elections in 2022.[1][5]

She has also been in the news in connection with controversial MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell. In April 2022, at an appearance together, Lindell disclosed having personally donated an amount in the range from $200,000 to $800,000 to Peter's legal defense fund and campaign, in apparent violation of Colorado state law limiting donations of that type to $75.[12] The state's ethics commission investigated the fund after a complaint about a lack of donor transparency.[13] Tina Peters denied prior knowledge.[14]

In late July 2022, Peters paid the $256k required for a manual recount of the voting for Colorado Secretary of State in Republican primary election in which she ran.[15] The recount barely changed the totals, with Peters gaining 13 votes, and having vote share of 29 percent. Peters filed suit challenging methods used in the recount, and on August 6, 2022 that suit was dismissed.[16]

On August 7, 2022, Peters pled not guilty to all charges related to the alleged election machine tampering, and a trial is being set for March.[17]

Personal

Peters lives in Grand Junction, Colorado. Peters' son, Remington J. Peters, a combat veterean serving in the US military as a Navy SEAL, died in 2017 at age 27 in a parachute accident. Notices at the time indicated surviving him were father, mother, and a sister.[18][19]

Before she ran for the Mesa County Clerk and Recorder position, "she ran a construction firm with her ex-husband and sold nutritional supplements and wellness products through a multilevel-marketing company. She was best known around the Western Slope of Colorado as the mother of a Navy seal who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan and, in 2017, died in a catastrophic accident when his parachute failed to properly open during an air show over the Hudson River. Her main campaign pledge was to reopen shuttered Motor Vehicle Department offices in the county."[2]

On September 7, The New Yorker published a long article by Sue Halpern titled: "The Election Official Who Tried to Prove "Stop the Steal": How a group of conspiracy theorists enlisted a county clerk in Colorado to find evidence that the 2020 vote was rigged."[2]

References

  1. ^ a b Timothy Bella; Emma Brown (May 11, 2022). "Judge bars indicted official Tina Peters from overseeing 2022 elections". Washington Post.
  2. ^ a b c Sue Halpern (September 7, 2022). "The Election Official Who Tried to Prove "Stop the Steal": How a group of conspiracy theorists enlisted a county clerk in Colorado to find evidence that the 2020 vote was rigged". The New Yorker.
  3. ^ a b "GOP Election Denier Tina Peters Loses Colorado Secretary of State Primary". English Times, part of the Times News Network of The Times of India. June 29, 2022.
  4. ^ Emma Brown. "Colorado county elections official Tina Peters is indicted in probe of alleged tampering with voting equipment". Washington Post.
  5. ^ a b Sam Levine (June 28, 2022). "Election denier Tina Peters loses Colorado primary for top poll official". The Guardian.
  6. ^ Joseph Ax (June 27, 2022). "In Colorado And Elsewhere, 2020 Election Deniers Seek Top Voting Offices".
  7. ^ Washington Post, more.
  8. ^ Ryan Bort (June 29, 2022). "Election denier denies her own 15-point loss". Rolling Stone.
  9. ^ Bente Birkeland (June 2022). "With Tina Peters on the ballot, Colorado's GOP Secretary of State primary paints stark differences over elections". Colorado Public Radio News.
  10. ^ Quentin Young, Tina Peters is a symptom; Threats to Colorado democracy go beyond her, Colorado Newsline, Aug. 20, 2021.
  11. ^ ‘Serious breach’ of voting security at center of investigation of Mesa County clerk’s office, Colorado Newsline, Aug. 9, 2021, revised Aug. 10.
  12. ^ Beese, Wilson (April 7, 2022). "Tina Peters responds after Mike Lindell said he donated $800K to defense fund". KUSA (TV). Retrieved June 24, 2022.
  13. ^ Paul, Jesse; Najmabadi, Shannon (April 5, 2022). "MyPillow CEO says he gave as much as $800,000 to Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters' legal defense fund". The Colorado Sun. Retrieved June 24, 2022.
  14. ^ Charles R. Davis; Azmi Haroun (June 28, 2022). "A timeline of the allegations against Tina Peters, the pro-Trump Colorado election official accused of facilitating an election data leak". Business Insider.
  15. ^ Andy Rose; Paul LeBlanc; Jeremy Harlan (July 28, 2022). "Indicted Colorado clerk Tina Peters pays for recount in primary loss for secretary of state". CNN.
  16. ^ Colleen Slevin (August 6, 2022). "Judge throws out Tina Peters recount challenge". CPR News. Associated Press.
  17. ^ "Colorado clerk Tina Peters pleads not guilty in election system breach". CBS News. September 7, 2022.
  18. ^ Tom McGhee (May 30, 2017). "Navy SEAL who died in skydiving demonstration "lived life to the fullest," family in Grand Junction say". Denver Post.
  19. ^ Sam LaGrone (May 30, 2017). "Updated: SEAL Killed in Fleet Week Parachuting Accident Identified as SO1 Remington Peters". USNI News.


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