Politics
‘Lawyer Up’: Democrat Secretary Of State Faces Major Legal Trouble After Sharing Election Passwords
Attorneys for the Trump campaign are targeting a top Democrat processing ballots after passwords for voting machines managed by her office erroneously appeared online.
A letter sent by Gessler Blue Law to Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold on Tuesday expanded on how serious the security breach is, with lawyers for former President Donald Trump calling on Griswold to halt the processing of mail-in ballots while an investigation takes place. Their demand comes after state election officials accidentally published BIOS passwords on their website, essentially the keys to Colorado’s voting equipment such as electronic voting machines. On Monday, “it was revealed that your office publicly disclosed BIOS passwords for voting system equipment for 63 of Colorado’s 64 counties beginning in at least August 2024 and continuing through Thursday, October 24, 2024. We are particularly concerned because your office knew of this security breach at least as early as October 24, yet concealed the problem by failing to notify anyone,” the attorneys wrote in their two-page letter.
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“As you know, anyone in possession of current BIOS passwords and with access to the affected election systems would have the ability to alter the Trusted Build of those systems without leaving signs of tampering in the software. Hence, this disclosure by your office—which we assume was inadvertent given that knowing publication of this information constitutes a Class 5 felony under SB 22-153—makes it essential that you act immediately to protect the integrity of Colorado’s general election,” they added.
The Trump campaign has long been suspicious of Colorado’s election integrity efforts given that Griswold was among the Democratic election officials who attempted to keep Trump off the ballot under an insurrectionist clause in the U.S. Constitution. Those efforts along with more in dozens of other states failed in March when the Supreme Court ruled Trump must remain on every state ballot. “I do believe that states should be able under our Constitution to bar oath-braking insurrectionists, and ultimately this decision leaves open the door for Congress to act to pass authorizing legislation,” Griswold said on MSNBC shortly after. “But we know that Congress is a nearly non-functioning body. So ultimately it will be up to the American voters to save our democracy in November.”
In a fatefully ironic twist, it now appears Griswold has threatened democracy by allowing any curious individual with a passing set of computer skills to tamper with Colorado’s voting machines. Trump’s lawyers are demanding that she immediately identify the affected counties, tear down the machines’ compromised software and build a new version, and halt the processing of all mail-in ballots until the new software is up and running.
NEW: Trump campaign demands Colorado Secretary of State @JenaGriswold (D) temporarily halt processing of mail ballots and re-secure voting systems in counties impacted by her office's leak of voting system passwords online. #copolitics pic.twitter.com/OXon4eQCCj
— Kyle Clark (@KyleClark) October 31, 2024
Attorney Mike Davis, founder of the conservative Article 3 Project and the former chief counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee, warned Griswold that she is in hot water because of the lapse in security. “Lawyer up, @JenaGriswold. The evidence strongly indicates you’ve committed a felony. You helped put Tina Peters in prison for 9 years for much less,” he wrote on X, referencing the former Colorado elections clerk who attempted to tamper with state voting machines to prove the 2020 election was stolen.
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