Trump-loving county clerk gets stiff sentence for 2020 election crimes

Mesa County, Colorado’s former clerk and recorder was sentenced to nine years in prison on Thursday for orchestrating a security breach in the wake of the 2020 election. Tina Peters was convicted by a jury in August and will serve her sentence first in the Mesa County Jail and then in the Colorado Department of Corrections.

“I'm convinced you would do it all over again if you could,” 21st Judicial District Judge Matthew Barrett told Peters during sentencing. “You’re as defiant a defendant as this court has seen.” The judge denied Peters’ request for probation or community correction. 

"Prison is the only place that duly meets the purposes of sentence in this matter," the judge said. 

Barrett also called Peters a “charlatan” who used her position “to peddle snake oil,” according to NBC News. During her sentencing hearing, Peters lamented she was “very taken aback by how awful I've been depicted,” said she was a “child of God,” and argued that she would not be able to get the right kind of magnetic mattress at the Department of Corrections if imprisoned there.