Trump appears unaware governors don't hand down prison sentences in wild Tina Peters post

President Donald Trump took to Truth Social on Wednesday to demand the release of convicted Colorado election official Tina Peters — while apparently not knowing that governors don't sentence people to prison.

"FREE TINA PETERS, A 73-YEAR-OLD WOMAN, WITH CANCER, GIVEN A NINE YEAR DEATH SENTENCE IN A COLORADO PRISON BY A DEMOCRAT GOVERNOR, JARED POLIS, AND A CORRUPT POLITICAL MACHINE, FOR EXPOSING FRAUD BY THE DEMOCRATS DURING THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION," Trump wrote in all caps on his social media platform.

There's just one problem: Colorado Gov. Jared Polis didn't sentence Peters. A jury convicted her, and a judge handed down the nine-year sentence after she was found guilty of tampering with voting equipment in Mesa County following the 2020 election, the same election Trump has falsely claimed was stolen.

Peters — who is 70 years old, not 73, as Trump claimed — was convicted in August 2024 on four felony and three misdemeanor counts related to her efforts to allow an unauthorized person to copy the hard drives of voting machines in her county. She has maintained that the actions were aimed at exposing election fraud, a claim courts have rejected.

Polis is a two-term Democratic governor who has occasionally broken with his party and even signaled his willingness to commute Peters' sentence, so long as she shows some remorse.