Mike Lindell (Drew Angerer/Getty Images), Merrick Garland (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images), Tina Peters (Marc Piscotty/Getty Images)
A former Republican clerk in Mesa County, Colorado, indicted in 2022 for official misconduct connected to her ill-fated attempt to prove that Dominion Voting Systems and its electronic voting machines stole the 2020 election from Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit in federal court against state officials and U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, claiming she’s being persecuted for asking questions about the “legitimacy” of President Joe Biden’s election.
Tina Peters is suing Garland, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold (D), and Mesa County District Attorney Daniel Rubinstein in attempt to shut down both the looming state prosecution and a federal investigation, the latter of which revealed her to be a “subject” — along with MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell — of an identity theft, intentional damage to a protected computer, and conspiracy probe.
Peters, who was featured in the Lindell-funded 2020 election conspiracy movie “[S]election Code,” is accused at the state level of tampering with election equipment, attempting to influence public servants, and engaging in official misconduct by allowing an unauthorized third party to make copies of voting machine hard drives, leading “confidential digital images” of county Dominion equipment and passwords to be “published on the internet.”
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District Colorado by attorney John Case, seeks a preliminary and permanent injunction in a bid to block the state and the feds from “conducting and proceeding with criminal proceedings, including investigations and prosecutions” until Peters’ claims make their way through court.
Peters argued that the state prosecution and distinct but related federal grand jury probe amount to violations of her First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, by unlawfully retaliating against her for “exercising her freedom of speech, freedom of association, and her right to petition the government for the redress of grievances,” and by punishing her for “efforts to comply with federal law governing the maintenance of election records[.]”
The plaintiff said she “has never stated or intimated any willingness to compromise the lawful operation of Mesa County’s or any other voting system equipment” and that any suggestion that she did is part of a larger project to “punish and retaliate against her” for “question[ing] the integrity of the November 2020 election[.]”
The filing, reading like a last resort ahead of Peters’ February 2024 state trial, noted that a state judge already “ruled that she may not present evidence at trial to support her First and Fourteenth Amendment defenses to the charges against her.”
Taken together, Peters’ lawsuit contends that she is being persecuted for asking questions about the 2020 election and warning about future elections:
Based upon the foregoing allegations and assertions, Defendant the United States has investigated Plaintiff to punish her for exercising her First Amendment free speech right for the purpose of informing her fellow citizens of illegal actions of Griswold and problems with the computer voting system in Mesa County, to petition for the redress of grievances, to associate for the purpose of expressive advocacy, and to discourage her and those who would associate with her from exercising their right to associate, to petition for redress of grievances, and to speak freely and publicly about the need for reform of the election system.
Read the Peters complaint here.
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