Transcription
This is Democracy Watch. Mark, we have a really shocking story here. So, there is a pro-Trump election clerk who was charged and incarcerated for her role in a 2021 voting system data breach. She was incarcerated in state prison, and now Donald Trump is trying to, uh, to do something unprecedented to be able to get her out. Can you explain what the news is here?
Yeah, I wish I could explain the how, but this is the big breaking news that everyone needs to pay attention to. Tina Peters, as you point out, is in a Colorado state prison, having been convicted in Colorado state court. Now, you know, she has become a cause célèbre for election deniers, both within the White House and outside, right? She is sort of a national, uh, martyr of sorts for people who want to undermine free and fair elections, and particularly people who want to lie about the 2020 elections. Uh, and she has real strong support within the administration. And for months, you and I have been watching as the administration has waged sort of low-level warfare, essentially legal warfare against, uh, the state of Colorado, trying to, uh, get her released. And they've done it through court filings. Donald Trump has suggested something bad might happen to the state of Colorado if they don't release, uh, Tina Peters. And now we have from the team at Democracy Docket this really, um, disturbing news report that essentially the Trump administration wants her transferred from state custody to federal custody. So, in other words, move from the state prison system to the federal prison system. Now, this is, to say the least, highly unusual and irregular because she's being incarcerated in state, uh, custody because she was convicted of a state crime. She has not been charged, as far as I know, with any federal offense. Like, there is no basis for having her, um, uh, incarcerated in federal custody. One is only left to assume that either the Trump administration wants her moved to federal custody so that they could somehow then release her outside of the jurisdiction of Colorado, which would be, I mean, would be a blockbuster obstruction of justice by the U.S. government against a lawful state, um, criminal, uh, order. Or they want to put her in federal custody to give her some improved conditions. Um, you know, which we saw, uh, reported around Ghislaine Maxwell, who was in federal custody, uh, as part of her conviction related to the Epstein, uh, matters, but was in a higher security prison, and then after she miraculously, uh, gave an interview with, um, one of Donald Trump's personal lawyers turned, uh, federal prosecutor, saying that Donald Trump had done nothing wrong, she was unaware of Donald Trump ever doing wrong. Now she has improved conditions in a much lower security, uh, facility.
As far as you know, is it legal to to move someone who has no case, no prosecution, no conviction in the federal court system to move them from this, this a state prison into into a federal prison? I mean, you do get these circumstances where there are disputes between state and federal, um, officials as to where someone ought to serve their sentence. You know, imagine, for example, you have someone who is convicted of federal terrorism charges and also state murder charges.
Right. But this is a situation where you don't have the competing [laughter] interest. It's only a state prosecution.
Correct. Um, and so under these circumstances, it is highly, highly unusual. I'll be honest with you, I am not familiar with it ever happening. I imagine it might happen in instances where, for example, a state, uh, facility is overcrowded and and they contract with the state federal government to to, you know, keep someone in custody on behalf of the state. But this is not that. I mean, this is obviously just the latest effort by the Department of Justice to try to strong-arm the state of Colorado to essentially give up their, uh, their punishment of someone convicted in state court. And look, you know, Tina Peters filed a federal habeas petition, which is what you do when you're incarcerated in state prison and you believe your federal constitutional rights, uh, have been, uh, have been denied. Uh, of course, that is, that the result of that wouldn't be to be moved to federal prison. It would just be to be released. Um, uh, the federal government in the form of the Trump administration has supported that petition. Um, and and obviously we've seen Donald Trump suggest that he's going to try to use the pardon power for people like Tina Peters, but of course, it doesn't apply to state crimes. So, I, I think that this is just the latest effort by Pam Bondi and the White House to try to put pressure on the state of Colorado, uh, to force them to find a way to release her. And I suspect, Brian, unfortunately, as we've seen, this is, you know, Donald Trump is willing to inappropriately and impermissibly use a lot of different pressure points with states, whether it's threatening federal funding, whether it's sending the U.S. military, like we've seen a lot of ways in which Donald Trump tries to apply pressure. And I suspect that this is just the tip of the iceberg of what we're going to see in Colorado. And you know, in my mind, I'm thinking, even if, in the unlikely event that she was transferred from state prison to federal prison, that he still wouldn't have the jurisdiction to be able to say he's going to pardon her because she was never convicted at the federal level. She was convicted at the state level. But at the same time, I think that I and others have to disabuse ourselves of this notion that Trump can't do something because because because he shouldn't do something because there's no legal avenue for him to do it when in reality, we know he's just going to do it. And then if she's in federal prison, who's going to stand there and stop him from making sure that those doors open and that she walks out the front door and is free? So, you know, like our our mentality in a lot of this is stuck in this kind of old way of thinking where, oh, Donald Trump can't do something, but then he does it and then it's done. And I think we have to get used to the fact that if he's trying to do that here, there is a very clear reason that he's trying to do it for.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, like I said, I am assuming that, you know, his goal here would either be, if he was able to effectuate this, would either be to release her outright in some state other than Colorado, which shouldn't, and I know you hate when lawyers say shouldn't in the age of Trump, but [clears throat] shouldn't, uh, prevent Colorado from then going to that state and having her return returned. But, you know, that's option one, I suppose. Option two is he says, you, you know what, you're, we're going to take you into federal custody and you will spend your incarceration, you know, at the Four Seasons where where we will, you know, we will set up a a floor at the Four Seasons as a federal, uh,
It's going to be like, uh, going to be like that prison at in Goodfellas where they're where they're cutting, uh, where they're grilling up steaks and cutting the garlic real thin, you know?
I mean, this is just what I'm, this is just what I'm imagining because otherwise, you know, this is totally bizarre. Um, but look, we've seen this. I mean, Donald Trump is now pardoning January 6th defendants for the second time. Like, you know, these are people who have been pardoned once and then the courts say, "Well, we're, you know, we're we're convicting you or putting you in prison for a crime unrelated to January 6th and then he pardons them again." So, you know, he is totally willing to to abuse the criminal justice system, not just to punish his enemies, right? We focus a lot on the punish the enemies part, but also to just do anything he can to try to prevent the punishment of anyone who has been a supporter of the big lie or election nihilism. And can you talk about that a little bit? Because we have seen now, not only has Trump pardoned those 1600 insurrectionists, uh, we like to call them the boots of the insurrection, but he's also signed, you know, under the cloak of darkness, the dead of night, just this past week, uh, pardons for everybody who was involved in in the law enforcement aspect of of perpetuating the big lie, the Jenna Ellis's and and and all of those other people who were involved at at at the the DOJ or the or or the federal government level. And and those are the suits of the insurrection. And so, can you talk about what this does? What what message this sends when you have all of the people who stormed the Capitol, all of the people who created the environment where those people could storm the Capitol, all of those people get a get out of jail free card. And look, we've got another election coming up in 2026 and 2028. And and and and so what does it say that now this is the message being sent ahead of those upcoming elections?
Yeah. So, just to be clear, the pardons you're referring to, the second bunch, um, are symbolic, right? I mean, he's pardoning people for state offenses. The fake elector scandals, for example, are are state offenses, and federal pardons don't apply there. And he's doing it, you know, and Ed Martin, I think, is the one who actually posted that, I think, on social media, where he said, "Leave no MAGA behind." Like, they're doing it to send a clear signal to the Tina Peters of the world that essentially, as long as Donald Trump is in office, he will move heaven and earth. He will do everything he can to reward them for their election nihilism, for their loyalty. And and that means that no matter what crime they have committed, no matter what jurisdiction they committed in, if they are loyal to Donald Trump, he will try to pardon them. He'll try to get spring them out of prison if they're in state prison, he'll do everything he can. He'll punish states if they pursue election deniers. Um, he will intimidate people like Tish James who have brought charges. Um, you know, that that that all of these things will be in service of these MAGA extremists, uh, who, uh, you know, in many cases had convictions that were pardoned. In some cases, like I said, he's proactively doing it, but he will do everything he can to protect them. And the message it sends going to 2026 is that if you are willing to subvert an election for Donald Trump, if you are willing to engage in violence to try to overturn the results of an election for Donald Trump, if you are willing to tamper with election results to benefit Donald Trump. Like, as long as it is in favor, favor of him and his cause, Donald Trump will be there for you. Like, no matter what you do, Donald Trump will be there with a pardon, with prosecutorial discretion, with going after your own political enemies, going after people who are bringing you to account, uh, to justice at the state level. Uh, he'll fire federal prosecutors who may have prosecuted you. He will fire FBI agents who may have investigated you. Like, like that is the message he wants to send. And I'll tell you, for those of us on the front lines of the fight for democracy in 2026, this is a daunting thing. I mean, you know, we have the Department of Justice already going after his political enemies. We've got the Department of Justice being used to attack voting rights, uh, and make it harder to vote. Uh, we've got a Republican voter suppression election subversion war machine that is funded by billionaires that is in court every single day. I see more lawsuits being filed by them. And against that, we are trying to do everything we can to also be in court to protect free and fair elections, also be combating the map rigging efforts that Republicans are doing. You know, my law firm, more than 12 cases involving redistricting alone. We have more than 60 cases, uh, all told involving voting. And we're doing that at the same time that, you know, as we recorded this video, Donald Trump's posted on social media a post that says, "Obama's Russia Hoax Treason Club," with me, a picture of me and my name right in the middle of it. Uh, uh, you know, along with James Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, Hill, you get the Hillary Clinton, you get the, you get the drill. So, like, we're dealing with all this stuff, and on their side, Donald Trump is just turbocharging them.
It's worth asking here. Um, we'll finish off with this. In terms of the plenary nature of the pardon power, does there need to be some, uh, some reforms to the pardon power? And and how would that even go about recognizing that the Constitution says that any president can pardon anybody for any reason?
Yeah. So, we need a lot of reforms, and you know, these reforms are not going to come easy, and they're not going to come quick. And anyone who thinks that, you know, if Democrats take control of Congress and Democrats win the White House in 2028, that come 2029, everything is going to snap back, that we'll be back in the days of Obama or Biden. That's not going to happen. Like, the damage that Donald Trump has done to our justice system, to our Constitution, to the rule of law, is going to be enduring, and it's going to, it's going to take years, if not a decade or more, for it to be fully repaired. And when it's repaired, it's not going to look like it did before. It's going to have to look different. And one of those things is, Brian, we're going to need to constrain presidents in ways that we have assumed they were constrained by good faith, in the way in which we assume they were constrained by sense of honor and decency. And it's going to look very different. So, you know, I think we're going to need grand jury reform. You know, we cannot have a system in which a grand jury, we joke that a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich. And therefore, we're, we're, we're trusting the nonpartisan nature of the prosecutors to be the check. We can't do that anymore. We need to put, make the grand juries a real check. You mentioned pardon power reform. You know, that's going to require changing the Constitution, but if ever there was something to change the Constitution for, this would be high on the list. He cannot have the president dispensing executive clemency, as it's called, uh, to to protect his, uh, uh, his, uh, his enforcers, uh, against, uh, against his opponents and against democracy. So, there's going to have to be a lot of reforms. It's something I focus a lot of my time and attention on at Democracy Docket. I write about this. I speak about it. It's one of the reasons why you and I do so many videos on these topics. And I want to take this opportunity right now to ask everyone to subscribe to this channel. There's a button right in front of you. You hit that button and hit the bell to make sure you are kept informed when there is new content because it's the best way to know what's happening to democracy in court.
Well, I appreciate that, and I would also highly recommend for anybody who has not yet signed up for Democracy Docket to be able to read about the reforms that are needed, as well as anything else going on in the voting rights world, the legal world. This is the newsletter. This is the site to subscribe to. So, I'm going to put the link to Democracy Docket right here on the screen and also in the post description of this video. Help support Mark's work, not just in the media ecosystem where we desperately need to elevate voices like his, but also on the front lines where he's fighting in the courts where it matters most right now. So again, that link is on the screen and also in the post description. I'm Brian Taylor Cohen.
I'm Mark Elias.
This is Democracy Watch.
[music]