Donald J.Trump hosts Tina Peters at White House after Colorado prison release
The former Mesa County clerk visited the president after serving two years of a nine-year sentence for allowing unauthorized access to voting machines.
WHITE HOUSE — Donald J.Trump hosted former Colorado county clerk Tina Peters at the White House for lunch after her release from state prison on June 30, 2026.
Here is the full post (see truthsocial): ““FREE TINA!” became the rallying cry of the Republican Party over the past two years. Tina Peters just came to the White House to thank me for getting her released from prison in Colorado. She was put there because she found Election Fraud, but instead of arresting the people that committed the Fraud, they arrested her! They gave her nine years in jail, and she served two, much time in solitary confinement along with hardened criminals and murderers, and then I got the Republican Party into gear, and she was released. Tina is 70-years-old, suffered a major bout with cancer, but hopefully is now cancer free. What she went through should never happen to anyone again. Just think of it, she caught the Democrats cheating, and they put her in jail for Voter Fraud. They didn’t want her out there speaking to the Media. She knows that the Voting Machines are RIGGED, that the Mail In Ballots are a DISASTER, and that our Elections are very Dangerous and Corrupt at a time when, with the Threat of Communism, we must be very wise and careful! It was an Honor to have lunch with her. I was fortunate, my Vote in 2024 was TOO BIG TO RIG, but they tried. There wasn’t a thing they could do about it, but not everyone is in that position. Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! Donald J.Trump“
Trump described Peters as a victim of political persecution and said he helped rally Republican support to secure her freedom. He called her a 70-year-old cancer survivor who endured solitary confinement alongside violent offenders during her two years behind bars.
Peters served as the elected clerk and recorder of Mesa County, Colorado. A jury convicted her in August 2024 on seven counts, including attempting to influence a public servant, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation and official misconduct (see Google). Prosecutors alleged she devised a scheme in 2021 to allow an unauthorized person to access Mesa County voting machines, and images from the equipment later appeared online (see kunc.org).
Judge Matthew Barrett sentenced Peters to nine years in prison, calling her a “charlatan” and “as defiant as a defendant as this court has ever seen,” the sentencing judge said (see Google). An appeals court later upheld her conviction but ruled she needed to be resentenced, finding that the judge had placed too much weight on her beliefs about election fraud, which constitute protected speech.
Democratic Colorado Gov. Jared Polis commuted Peters’ sentence in May 2026, reducing it to four years and roughly four-and-a-half months including time served. Polis told CBS News Colorado the lengthy prison term was “very unusual for a first-time nonviolent offender” and said he agreed with the appellate ruling on protected speech (see Google). Peters apologized in a written statement, acknowledging she “made mistakes” and “misled the Secretary of State when allowing a person to gain access to county voting equipment.”
The commutation drew sharp criticism from Colorado Democrats. Secretary of State Jena Griswold called it a “gross injustice to our elections, election workers and democracy.” Sen. Michael Bennet, who is running to replace Polis as governor, said Peters “broke the law, undermined our elections, and was convicted by a jury of her peers” (see Google). Attorney General Phil Weiser called the decision “mind-boggling and wrong as a matter of basic justice.”
Trump had pressured Colorado for months to release Peters, directing the Department of Justice to “take all necessary action to help secure” her freedom in a May 2025 social media post (see kunc.org). He also issued a presidential pardon for Peters, though the pardon power does not extend to state crimes. State audits found no evidence of election fraud in Colorado in the 2020 election and confirmed that machine vote tallies matched paper ballot markings (see kunc.org).
In the last 30 days, 136 of 555 Trump posts on Truth Social addressed the topic of elections.
Source: Zenger real-time database of all Truth Social posts.
Note: Chart generated on June 30, 2026 at 2:37 PM EST
Source: Zenger analysis
Note: Table generated by NewsFindr on June 30, 2026 at 2:37 PM EST