What Did Tina Peters Do? Breach, Sentence, and Commutation

Tina Peters, the elected Mesa County, Colorado clerk and recorder, orchestrated a 2021 security breach of her own county’s voting equipment in an attempt to find evidence supporting conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election. She smuggled an unauthorized outsider into a secure area during a routine Dominion Voting Systems software update, had surveillance cameras turned off, and let him copy the machines’ hard drives. Images of those drives, along with the equipment’s BIOS passwords, later showed up online and at a Mike Lindell “cyber symposium.” A jury convicted her on seven counts in August 2024, a judge sentenced her to nine years in prison that October, and Governor Jared Polis commuted her sentence in May 2026. She was released on parole on June 1, 2026.

The 2021 Voting Equipment Breach

Peters took office in 2019. By early 2021 she had become a vocal promoter of false claims that voting machines had stolen the 2020 election. In April of that year she hosted Douglas Frank, an Ohio mathematician on Mike Lindell’s payroll, at the Mesa County elections office, where he presented theories about “phantom voters” to her staff. An elections administrator secretly recorded the meeting.¹²

The breach itself came the next month, during a scheduled “trusted build” — the routine security update Dominion performs on county election equipment. Peters and her deputy clerk, Belinda Knisley, arranged for a California man named Conan Hayes to enter the secure tabulation room under the stolen identity of Gerald Wood, a local software engineer. Peters told Dominion employees the man was a motor-vehicles staffer training for the elections division. Wood later testified that he was not present and had not authorized the use of his identity.³⁴

Before the update began, Peters directed that the surveillance cameras in the secure room be turned off. Hayes then copied images of the voting machine hard drives. That August, those images and the equipment’s BIOS passwords were posted online, including on Telegram and the Gateway Pundit blog, and were showcased at Lindell’s “cyber symposium.” Peters and her co-conspirators used encrypted messaging apps and burner phones to communicate.⁵⁴

Who Helped Her

Peters did not act alone. Sherronna Bishop, a far-right activist and former campaign manager for U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, admitted at trial to directing key parts of the scheme, arranging Hayes’ trip from California, and coordinating with national election-fraud promoters. Prosecutors designated her an unindicted co-conspirator.¹

Deputy clerk Belinda Knisley pleaded guilty to misdemeanor trespass, official misconduct, and violation of duty, and cooperated against Peters in exchange for dismissal of felony charges. She was sentenced to two years of unsupervised probation, 150 hours of community service, and a permanent ban on working in elections.⁶ Sandra Brown, the county’s former elections manager, pleaded guilty to one felony count of attempting to influence a public servant and one misdemeanor count of official misconduct.⁷ Wood, whose identity was used, received limited immunity for his testimony.¹

What the Breach Cost Mesa County

Once the breach became public in August 2021, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold called it the “first insider elections breach in the nation,” moved to decertify all 41 pieces of compromised equipment, and appointed a designated official to run the county’s elections.⁸⁹

The county had to replace its entire Dominion inventory before an August 30, 2021 deadline set to accommodate overseas military balloting for the November election. Dominion replaced the equipment at no extra cost, but the county signed a new contract paying roughly $96,200 annually through 2029.¹⁰¹¹³

The Charges and the Verdict

A Mesa County grand jury indicted Peters on March 8, 2022, on ten counts, including three felony counts of attempting to influence a public servant, criminal impersonation, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, identity theft, and three misdemeanors covering official misconduct, violation of duty, and failing to comply with an order from the Secretary of State.¹²

Her trial in Mesa County District Court began July 29, 2024, before Judge Matthew Barrett. On August 12, 2024, the jury found her guilty on seven counts: three felony counts of attempting to influence a public servant, one felony count of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, and three misdemeanor counts. She was acquitted of two counts of criminal impersonation and one count of identity theft.³

The Nine-Year Sentence

On October 3, 2024, Judge Barrett sentenced Peters to nine years in prison, with three and a half years on each felony count of attempting to influence a public servant.¹³ From the bench, Barrett called Peters “as defiant as any defendant this court has ever seen” and told her she was “no hero” but a “charlatan” who had abused her position. He said he was convinced she would “do it all over again” if she could, and that her continued public claims about voting machine fraud were “just more lies” driven by her enjoyment of “the jets, the podcasts, and people fawning over” her. She was taken into custody immediately.¹¹

Why She’s Out: The Pardon, the Appeal, and the Commutation

On December 5, 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive grant of clemency purporting to pardon Peters for election-related offenses. On April 2, 2026, the Colorado Court of Appeals ruled in People v. Peters that the presidential pardon “has no impact on Peters’s state law offenses,” because the president’s pardon power extends only to federal offenses. The court also rejected her claim that the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause shielded her, finding she was not a federal officer and was not acting under any federal duty.¹⁴

The appeals court upheld all seven convictions but reversed the nine-year sentence, finding that the trial court had improperly considered Peters’ protected speech when imposing the prison term. The opinion drew a line between her beliefs and her conduct: “The trial court’s comments about Peters’s belief in the existence of 2020 election fraud went beyond relevant considerations for her sentencing. Her offense was not her belief … it was her deceitful actions in her attempt to gather evidence of such fraud.” The case was remanded for resentencing.¹⁵

On May 15, 2026, Governor Jared Polis commuted Peters’ sentence from nine years to four years and four and a half months, making her eligible for immediate parole. Polis called the original term “extremely unusual and lengthy” for a first-time, nonviolent offender, cited the appellate ruling on free-speech considerations, and said Peters’ clemency application “demonstrates taking responsibility” and a “commitment to follow the law going forward.” He did so over the objections of his 11-person clemency advisory board, which had voted unanimously twice — in January and again a month later — to reject her request.¹³¹⁶

Where Things Stand Now

Peters walked out of the La Vista Correctional Facility on the morning of June 1, 2026, after roughly 19 months inside.¹⁷ Her parole agreement, signed May 28, 2026, requires her to live in Colorado and to get her parole officer’s permission before traveling out of state or moving. She cannot possess firearms, alcohol, illegal drugs, or marijuana. She must maintain employment or attend a full-time educational or vocational program, complete a cognitive behavioral therapy program, and undergo a mental health evaluation with follow-up treatment.¹⁸

In a post-release interview on “Bannon’s War Room,” Peters described her 606 days in prison as “quite the ordeal” and said she planned to pursue “prison reform” and “election reform.” She again claimed she had been imprisoned as “retribution” for “exposing the election machines.”¹⁷ Her attorneys have indicated they plan to appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court, arguing again that federal immunity should shield her from prosecution.¹⁹ Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said he intends to “continue to fight Tina Peters’ efforts to overturn her conviction in the courts.”

She also faces three pending ethics complaints before the Colorado Independent Ethics Commission, all filed by Anne Landman. The complaints allege that Peters accepted thousands of dollars in services, travel, and security from Mike Lindell, improperly operated a criminal legal defense fund, and accepted an $800,000 contribution from Lindell. Those proceedings were paused during the criminal trial and are now moving forward. Under the commission’s penalty structure, which doubles the value of an unallowed expenditure, potential fines could exceed $1 million.²⁰

1
Colorado Sun. Sherronna Bishop Testifies at Tina Peters Trial
2
Colorado Newsline. Key Witness Takes Stand at Tina Peters Trial
3
Colorado Newsline. Tina Peters Sentenced to Nine Years in Prison Over Voting Systems Breach
4
Courthouse News Service. Mesa County Clerk Ousted Over Leaked Voting Machine Passwords Pleads Not Guilty
5
Votebeat. Tina Peters Election Security Threat
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Colorado Sun. Belinda Knisley Pleads Guilty
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Colorado Sun. Sandra Brown Guilty Plea in Mesa County Tina Peters Case
8
Grand Junction Sentinel. Decertified Election Equipment Could Prove Costly to County
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Colorado Secretary of State. Press Release on Indictments
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Colorado Newsline. Mesa County Commissioners Vote to Replace Dominion Voting Equipment
11
PBS NewsHour. Tina Peters Sentenced to Nine Years in Prison for Voting Data Scheme
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Colorado Newsline. Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters Indicted by Grand Jury
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Colorado Newsline. Polis Commutes Tina Peters Prison Sentence
14
Colorado Court of Appeals. People v. Peters, 2026COA24
15
Colorado Newsline. Court Orders Resentencing of Tina Peters
16
New York Times. Colorado Clemency Board and Tina Peters
17
Colorado Sun. Tina Peters Released From Colorado Prison
18
Colorado Politics. After Prison Release Tina Peters Faces Tight Parole Limits and Ongoing Legal Troubles
19
News From the States. Tina Peters Plans Appeal to Colorado Supreme Court
20
The Gazette. Ethics Complaints Against Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters Will Move Forward