Nothing To See Here, Just Another MAGA Republican Headed to the Big House

So many Trump supporters have gone to jail, we barely even notice anymore

Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters. Credit: Hart Van Denburg/CPR News

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Since I live in a state with just enough extreme voters to vote a holocaust denier like Mark Robinson into office, the fact that I’m surrounded by people who still support Donald Trump should come as no surprise.

Unlike the rural diners filled with Trump supporters that have captivated the media over the last decade, our beach community prefers pubs and wine bars. Still, it is easy for me to become immersed in the company of the former president’s fans. Some are of the flag-waving MAGA variety, but most are his less overt supporters.

As a rule, I avoid mixing alcohol and politics in public, but sometimes it is unavoidable. If I stick around long enough, I will surely be drawn into a political conversation. My sense is that my fellow patrons are curious as to my political leanings because, as one of the few Black people in the vicinity I am a distinct anomaly.

Without fail, these individuals present themselves as pre-2016 conservatives. They attempt to convince me, to the point of desperation, that while they voted for Trump once or perhaps even twice, they do not subscribe to his brand of politics. Their unspoken message is that they will not vote for Trump again. But given that Trump is their party’s nominee for the third time in a row, this is as statistically unlikely as happening upon an Asian unicorn. Like the cloth coat and Rockefeller Republicans before them, the non-MAGA species of their party is all but extinct. So of course they will vote for him.

Even though I know they are lying to my face, I give a bit of grace to Republicans who engage in this deception. After all, discussing one’s support for a candidate surrounded by concentric circles of criminal activity can be an embarrassing conversation outside the safety of a Trump rally.

But their deception proves too difficult to maintain. As much as they try to avoid doing so, eventually, they say something that lets the cat out of the proverbial bag. Like the response to a “Whataboutisms” category in an imaginary round of Jeopardy, the comment always takes the form of a question:

“What about the Biden Crime Family?”

“What about Hunter Biden’s laptop?”

“What about Joe Biden’s crimes?”

What follows is a Spotify playlist of non-sequiturs and unfounded claims. Implicit in their argument is the incongruous proposition that Joe Biden is an aged fool unable to find his way out of a closet and the kingpin of a global crime syndicate.

As for Kamala Harris—who, if she were a white man, would be the subject of high praise—she is a dim-witted “empty suit,” a beneficiary of diversity, equity, and inclusion, who has failed (or perhaps slept) her way up the career ladder and into the vice presidency—a position which she does not deserve.

How Starting an Investment Business Almost Landed Me In A Federal Prison

For reasons I have yet to decipher, the minds of these faux-normal Republicans are impervious to the news that, while they are laser-focused on non-existent criminality, one member of the GOP after another is landing themselves in jail.

They shrug off the hundreds of their compatriots—from attorneys to members of law enforcement to suburban housewives—who have committed the crimes they would have me believe concern them.

That the through-line for this wave of law-breaking traces back to Donald Trump barely moves the needle with them.

Another one bites the dust

As millions watched last week’s Democratic National Convention, yet another Trump-supporting rube joined the ranks of the soon-to-be-incarcerated. A Colorado jury found Tina Peters, a former Mesa County Clerk, guilty of seven charges in a ten-count indictment—including four felonies—related to a security breach of the county’s election computer system following the 2020 election.

Due to the voluminous number of Trump-related criminal indictments, the Peters case has gone under the radar. But because of the mind-blowing details of the case, I’ve followed it for the last couple of years. Here’s the rundown of the jury’s decision (emphasis added):

Peters was convicted of first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty, failure to comply with requirements of the Secretary of State, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, and three counts of attempt to influence a public servant…

…Peters, who was indicted in March 2022, was accused of copying hard drive images of election software in 2021, which ended up online and being discussed by Peters and others at conspiracy theorist and pillow salesman Mike Lindell’s South Dakota symposium…

…[Peters] allegedly used someone else’s security badge to give an expert affiliated with the My Pillow chief executive access to the system. During the trial, the prosecution argued that Peters deceived government employees so she could work with Lindell to become famous.

Prosecutors say [Peters] became “fixated” on voting problems after becoming involved with those questioning the accuracy of the 2020 presidential election results.

Peters used her position as Mesa County’s clerk to “Stop the Steal,” compromising the election equipment she was charged with protecting in the process, thus rendering the county’s election equipment useless:

While the unauthorized access did not create an imminent, direct security risk to Colorado's elections, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said her office's investigation confirmed that the unauthorized person did release the passwords for the underlying voting machine software online.

"We know that that information was posted by an extreme conspiracy theorist last week," Griswold said, referring to the Gateway Pundit, a conservative news site that traffics in election conspiracy theories.

According to 2021 reporting by Vice Media, after the FBI opened an investigation into her shenanigans, the “My Pillow Guy” hid Peters away in a safe house (emphasis added):

Unfortunately for the FBI, the official at the center of the probe, Mesa County clerk Tina Peters, is “holed up” in a safe house provided by pillow salesman and conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell.

Lindell told VICE News that he had initially taken Peters to Texas following his three-day Cyber Symposium last week, where the Colorado official was a star attraction. But a disgruntled member of Lindell’s own security team leaked Peters’ location earlier this week and so she was moved to another, unknown, location…

…Peters has been accused of allowing someone who was not an employee of the county to access a secure room where voting machines are stored and permitting them to copy sensitive information from those machines. Days later, while employees from Dominion were performing a routine software upgrade on the machine, the same person, Gerald Wood, was allowed into the room.

While inside, he captured video of the upgrade taking place. The video and the copied data were then leaked to Ron Watkins, the former administrator of 8kun, the website where QAnon flourished. Peters is also accused of ordering staff to turn off surveillance cameras in the room prior to bringing the outsider in.

[Jena] Griswold, the secretary of state, launched an investigation into the matter last week, but when her officials went to meet Peters and inspect the equipment, the clerk was not present.

That’s because she was on Lindell’s private jet, flying to the MyPillow CEO’s Cyber Symposium in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

At the conference, Peters was a headline attraction, appearing on stage on all three days of the event. Also appearing at the event was Watkins, who presented the data that had been leaked from Mesa County.

That Old-Time Religion

The “expert” Peters spirited in to observe the Dominion’s software update and copy of the hard drive was Conan Hayes, a former California surfer affiliated with Lindell, according to The Associated Press.

Sheesh.

With her conviction, Peters may be the first election official found guilty of charges related to Trump’s Big Lie conspiracy theory. But with a dozen or so Republican delegates currently under indictment, she probably won't be the last.

Unfortunately, my Trump-supporting pub mates are focused so keenly on throwing Democrats in jail for imaginary crimes, that I doubt they’ll even notice. Perhaps they see a criminal rap sheet as a badge of honor.