WASHINGTON — A Republican county clerk in Colorado who a judge prevented from overseeing local elections last year has announced that she is running to become Colorado's secretary of state.
Tina Peters, the clerk for Mesa County, made the announcement in a podcast interview Monday with former Trump aide Steve Bannon, saying she wants to "restore trust" and end "government overreach in our election process." She is one of many supporters of Former President Donald Trump who want to oversee future elections.
"Colorado needs a secretary of state who will put people over political theater and prioritize them over politics, and Colorado deserves a secretary of state who will stand up to the Biden administration that wants to run our country into the ground with nationalized elections," Peters said.
The announcement comes a month after she said she would run for re-election as county clerk. Peters, who has been a proponent of false fraud claims about the 2020 election, said at a re-election rally that constituents brought concerns to her about the state's elections in 2020 and 2021, a local newspaper, The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, reported.
“If we don’t stand up and tell the truth and fight for your vote, I don’t know where we’re going to end up,” she said, according to the paper. “Today we are living in an exciting time. Things are changing, and moving towards freedom. I won’t quit against corruption.”
Colorado's current secretary of state, Democrat Jena Griswold sued Peters last year, alleging she allowed an "unauthorized individual" to participate in the process for installing an update to the county's electronic voting system, which the lawsuit said led to the "the public disclosure of State-guarded passwords needed to access the equipment. It appears that the passwords were then used by an as-yet unknown person or persons to access the equipment."
A judge then decided last October to remove Peters as the designated election official for Mesa County, saying she and her deputy "committed a breach and neglect of duty and other wrongful acts."
State and federal authorities are investigating the alleged voting-machine breach. Griswold is also suing to prevent Peters from administering the upcoming election in November and said in a statement after Peters announced her candidacy that she is "unfit to be secretary of state and a danger to Colorado elections.”
Peters has denied any wrongdoing and has called the litigation against her "a power grab" that would erode elections checks and balances. She also has claimed that the alleged breach was an effort by her to back up the voting system and preserve records. She did not immediately return NBC News' request for comment.
In the podcast interview, Peters said she wants to fight to keep elections local as Colorado's secretary of state.
"I want to fight against the Biden and the radical left to take over our vote," she said. "And I am the wall between your vote and nationalized elections. They're coming after me because I'm standing in their way of truth, transparency and election held closest to the people and we need to restore the truth in elections."
Last week, Peters was arrested for allegedly resisting arrest by local police who were investigating her for an alleged illegal recording of a subordinate’s court hearing on an iPad. She faces misdemeanor charges of obstructing justice.
When Bannon mentioned the arrest, Peters would not elaborate on the charges, saying only of the incident, "I still have the bruises on my arm where they manhandled me.”
Peters did not immediately return a request for comment about the charges.
