POTUS pardons Tina Peters, sparking standoff with Colorado state officials
After more than a year in prison, President Trump has issued a symbolic presidential pardon for former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, but the situation has become contentious
by Summer Lane | December 12, 2025
President Donald Trump announced on Thursday his intent to fully pardon Tina Peters, a former Mesa County Clerk in Colorado, after routinely criticizing the state for imprisoning the 70-year-old Gold Star mother.
“Democrats have been relentless in their targeting of TINA PETERS, a Patriot who simply wanted to make sure that our Elections were Fair and Honest,” the president wrote in a statement posted to Truth Social.
He continued, “Tina is sitting in a Colorado prison for the ‘crime’ of demanding Honest Elections. Today I am granting Tina a full Pardon for her attempts to expose Voter Fraud in the Rigged 2020 Presidential Election!”
As reported by LindellTV, Peters was sentenced last year to a total of nine years of incarceration for charges related to allegedly breaching election equipment in 2021. She has been in prison for over one year and is reportedly suffering from poor health.
President Trump’s pardon for Tina Peters comes after her attorney, Peter Ticktin, formally urged the president to issue such a pardon in a letter earlier this week.
He wrote, “I have formally notified President Trump urging a presidential pardon and outlining why Tina is a necessary witness in exposing election misconduct. What happened to her was a travesty, and it’s time to set it right.”
However, Peters was convicted on Colorado state charges; therefore, President Trump’s federal pardon has come under fire from Colorado Governor Jared Polis (D):
“Tina Peters was convicted by a jury of her peers, prosecuted by a Republican District Attorney, and found guilty of violating Colorado state laws, including criminal impersonation. No President has jurisdiction over state law nor the power to pardon a person for state convictions. This is a matter for the courts to decide, and we will abide by court orders.”
For her part, Ms. Peters has argued that the election data she preserved in 2021 – which she was charged and convicted on – was “REQUIRED BY FEDERAL LAW[.]”
Ms. Peters’ X account, which has acted as her mouthpiece while she is incarcerated, alleged on Friday:
“JUDGE MATTHEW BARRET REFUSED TO LET THE JURY HEAR TINA’S DEFENSE DURING TRIAL[.] 41 MOTIONS WERE DENIED PREVENTING THE JURY FROM HEARING THE TRUTH: CLERK PETERS IS THE ONLY CLERK IN COLORADO TO PRESERVE PROOF OF ILLEGAL DELETION OF ELECTION RECORDS FROM THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION BY CO SOS JENA GRISWOLD[.]”
The limits of presidential authority over state charges are soon to be tested. Peter Ticktin said on Friday that Ms. Peters was a “political prisoner” and argued that placing her in the maximum security unit of a prison was “cruel punishment” and insinuated that her routine visits to solitary confinement were unusual.
Ticktin has urged Colorado to release Peters while litigation unfolds on this matter:
“The governor has no way to know which way the courts will decide the issue of whether President Trump has the right to pardon prisoners who were convicted of state offenses. As such, he has no right to hold her. It is not an option for him to hold someone in prison when he cannot know if she should be released or held. That issue must always be determined in favor of the individual who is incarcerated. He has no right to keep a person in prison because she may belong there. If he does, he is, at the very least, imprisoning a pardoned lady, which has serious legal ramifications and liabilities.”
This comes after a federal magistrate judge on Monday denied Peters’ request to be released from prison while she appeals her conviction, according to The National News Desk.
Photo: Adobe Stock
