by WorldTribune Staff, June 19, 2025 Real World News
Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold has been ordered by the Department of Justice to turn over "all records" related to the 2024 election and to preserve any remaining records from 2020.
“We recently received a complaint alleging noncompliance by your office" concerning the National Voter Registration Act, and that “all records” related to the election were needed to evaluate the complaint, the Justice Department wrote in a letter to Griswold.
The DOJ also requested “All statutes, regulations, written guidance, internal policies, or database user ‘manuals that set out the procedures Colorado has put in place” to retain records related to elections.
According to the Denver Post, Griswold said her office either didn’t have access to other records that were requested, which are kept by individual counties, or her office didn’t believe the Justice Department had a legal basis for seeking them.
The request for Colorado's election data came not long after President Donald Trump demanded the release of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters.
Peters is serving a nine-year sentence after being convicted of facilitating a breach of her county's election systems. Peters has claimed she was concerned that a voting machine software update would wipe out election records and that she wanted to preserve that data.
Related: Trump to Colorado: ‘Free Tina Peters, now,’ May 6, 2025
In a statement to 9NEWS, Griswold said: "Donald Trump has weaponized his Department of Justice – targeting his perceived enemies and meddling in state cases to try and free those who supported his big election lie. I will always follow the law and protect our democracy, and won’t be intimidated by this baseless inquiry. Colorado runs the best elections in the nation and complies with all federal and local laws in doing so."
The Denver Post cited Griswold as saying that the federal laws cited in the Justice Department’s letter were the same used by Peters’s defense to claim that she was only seeking to preserve election records.
Matt Crane, executive director of the Colorado County Clerks Association, said in response to the DOJ's order, “Well, it's certainly an unusual request. I don't remember any request from the federal government this expansive coming in,” according to Denver 7.
