Right-wing group loses bid to block new trial in Colorado voter intimidation suit

By Natalie Hausmann

The Ralph Carr Judicial Building, which houses the Colorado Supreme Court and Colorado Court of Appeals, in Denver on Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

A federal appeals court is giving pro-voters a second chance to prove a Colorado “election integrity” group unlawfully intimidated voters.

A regional NAACP group, along with the League of Women Voters Colorado and Mi Familia Vota had accused the United States Election Integrity Plan (USEIP) of intimidating voters by showing up at individual voters’ houses to ask who they had voted for, taking pictures of their homes and making allegations of voter fraud.

A federal judge in Colorado held a trial but ultimately decided the pro-voting groups had not successfully proved voter intimidation. On appeal, 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in July ordered the judge to hold a second trial. 

That trial will go forward after the 10th Circuit on Friday denied the right-wing group’s request to reconsider the order for a new trial.

The pro-voters’ initial brief to the federal appeals court stated USEIP members were “armed with badges and weapons” and said the district court’s decision was based on both legal and factual mistakes. They argue the anti-voting group violated parts of the Voting Rights Act and the Ku Klux Klan Act.

In one instance, the pro-voting groups said the district court didn’t let them show a video depicting Shawn Smith, USEIP co-founder and defendant, making violent remarks suggesting voters be lynched.

“During his remarks, Smith asserted that anyone involved in election fraud ‘deserves to hang’ because ‘sometimes the old ways are the best ways,’” plaintiffs wrote.

Pro-voters said excluding this key piece of evidence made for an unfair trial.

“Without the video, the defendant’s threat of physical harm against future voters came into the record only through the defendant’s own sanitized testimony and his attorney’s inaccurate characterization of it,” the brief reads.

It’s notable that Smith, one of USEIP’s three co-founders, briefly found work with none other than staunch election denier and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, according to the 2022 lawsuit. Lindell recently lost his bid for Minnesota governor, but still denies his own double-digit defeat.