Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold appeared on CBS News’ 60 Minutes Sunday to discuss threats to election security, using part of the interview to criticize former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, whose prosecution Griswold helped pursue.
Peters was sentenced to nine years in prison after Griswold and Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser prosecuted her in connection with a 2020 breach of Mesa County’s election system, during which a copy of a voting-system hard drive was made before a scheduled system update.
In the interview with CBS correspondent Bill Whitaker, Griswold said Peters “was elected by her county to uphold the elections. Instead — she attacked the elections from within,” and said Peters “ordered that her video surveillance cameras be turned off and then took images of the voting equipment and shared it with a network of election deniers.”
When Whitaker asked what harm resulted from Peters’ actions, Griswold said the damage was to “voting equipment, confidence in Colorado elections and American elections, and election workers.” Whitaker did not ask Griswold to specify how the equipment, elections or workers were harmed, nor did he ask about the legal basis for a county clerk preserving election data.
The Peters Case
A jury acquitted Peters of identity theft, accepting her defense that a Mesa County employee, Gerald Wood, had consented to the use of his credentials to access the voting system. Peters has said she acted to preserve election records ahead of a state-mandated system upgrade, and has maintained that no ballots or results were altered as a result of her actions.
An appeals court later found that the sentencing judge’s comments about Peters’ beliefs were improper and vacated her sentence, according to Courthouse News. Before Peters could be resentenced, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis issued a commutation letter shortening her sentence so she could be released on parole, citing the appeals court’s reasoning.
Griswold’s Own Record
Whitaker’s interview did not address several controversies involving Griswold’s own office. In 2024, Griswold’s office posted an Excel file online that contained a hidden page listing roughly 600 passwords to voting systems covering nearly every county in Colorado. The file was discovered while voting was already underway in the state. Griswold said at the time there was no “immediate security threat.” No charges have been filed over the incident.
Separately, Griswold’s office sent about 31,000 postcards to foreign nationals in 2022 with instructions on how to register to vote ahead of that year’s midterms. The mailing used data from the Electronic Registration Information Center, which draws information from state agencies including motor vehicle departments; in Colorado, foreign nationals can obtain driver’s licenses. Griswold’s office declined to cooperate with county officials seeking to determine whether any ineligible residents had voted in the 2022 election.
The 2024 Ballot Fight
Griswold also supported efforts to remove Donald Trump from Colorado’s 2024 primary ballot. Six Colorado voters, backed by the group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, sued to disqualify Trump under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which bars former officials who engaged in insurrection from holding office. The Colorado Supreme Court ruled 4-3 that Trump was ineligible for the ballot. Griswold filed a brief supporting the ruling, arguing states have authority to exclude Trump and that he should not receive a “get out of jail free” card.
The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously reversed the Colorado ruling, holding that states lack constitutional authority to remove a presidential candidate from the ballot on insurrection grounds. Griswold said afterward she was “disappointed” by the ruling and called it “concerning that federal candidates, at this point, can engage in insurrection and then face no accountability for ballot access.”
CBS News did not ask Griswold during the interview how her stated concerns about election confidence square with her support for the attempt to remove Trump from the ballot, or how the password leak and noncitizen mailing affected public trust in Colorado’s elections.
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