Trump is punishing Colorado over Tina Peters

President Donald Trump vetoed a bipartisan bill last week to fund a clean water pipeline in southeastern Colorado, citing the high price tag of the project as the reason in a message to Congress. 

But some Colorado lawmakers and elected officials aren’t buying the president’s line.

Trump’s veto is just the latest move in a series of crucial funding cuts — along with a federal investigation into the state’s prison system — for Colorado that state leaders say is political payback over the incarceration of Tina Peters, the former GOP county clerk who’s currently serving a nine-year prison sentence for her role in a voting system data breach. Last month Trump issued a legally unenforceable “pardon” to Peters, since she was convicted on state, not federal charges.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) has repeatedly said he would not pardon Peters.

Attorneys for Peters, who’s become a cause célèbre among conspiracy-driven far-right activists, are trying to use Trump’s “pardon” to compel a court to release her. Her attorneys last week asked the Colorado Court of Appeals to consider if Trump’s pardon applies to “state court convictions.” On Tuesday, Peters asked a federal court to immediately release her while the state court considers her appeal, claiming she is “in great and immediate danger to irreparable injury” while she waits.

Early last month the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) opened a sweeping, unexpected civil rights investigation into Colorado’s statewide prison system, “following multiple reports of unconstitutional and legally insufficient carceral conditions,” according to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon. 

The announcement came just days after Trump renewed his public calls to “free” Peters, who was convicted for allowing unauthorized people to access state voting machine software, in an attempt to find voter fraud fueled by right-wing conspiracies. The following day, Trump “pardoned” Peters. 

Despite Trump’s “pardon,” along with a slew of social media rants directed at Colorado’s elected officials — including one where the president told Polis to “rot in hell” — Polis has reiterated that he would not pardon Peters. 

“Tina Peters was convicted by a jury of her peers, prosecuted by a Republican District Attorney, and found guilty of violating Colorado state laws, including criminal impersonation,” Polis said in a statement. “No President has jurisdiction over state law nor the power to pardon a person for state convictions. This is a matter for the courts to decide, and we will abide by court orders.”

Days after Polis’ statement, the Trump administration announced it was moving to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research — a 60-year-old federal climate and environmental research center in Boulder. Less than a week later, Trump denied Polis’ request for disaster relief funding for fire and flood recovery. The Elk and Lee wildfires in August, along with record-breaking flooding in the state in October reportedly caused around $40 million in damages. 

Though the Trump administration didn’t give any reason for denying disaster funding, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser (D) told the Colorado Sun he believes Trump’s recent actions are part of a “retribution campaign” over Peters. 

“This administration is a threat to the rule of law, and we’ve got to address this concern with every tool we can,” Weiser said. 

Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), who sponsored the clean water pipeline bill in the Senate, called Trump’s veto “unacceptable.”

“This isn’t governing. It’s a revenge tour,” Bennet said on social media, inferring that Trump’s veto was part of his retribution over Peters. “I’ll keep fighting to get rural Colorado the clean water they deserve.”

But not every elected official believes Trump is punishing Colorado solely because of Peters. 

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), who sponsored the clean water pipeline funding bill, suggested in a statement that Trump’s veto may have been political retaliation against her. Boebert, who’s been a staunch Trump ally since she entered Congress in 2021, reportedly drew ire from the president for being one of the few Republicans to support a House measure compelling the DOJ to release all of the Epstein files.

“I sincerely hope this veto has nothing to do with political retaliation for calling out corruption and demanding accountability,” Boebert said in a statement. “Americans deserve leadership that puts people over politics.”