Has Tina Peters been "fully pardoned" by Donald Trump, wiping out her prison sentence for giving unauthorized access to Mesa County, Colorado, voting machines in 2021, when she was county clerk? No, that's not true: Trump's "pardon" of Peters is only symbolic, not official. The U.S. Constitution grants the President power to pardon only those criminals facing federal charges. Peters, who sought to prove the election was stolen from Trump, was convicted of state crimes by a local district court jury and sentenced to nine years in a state penitentiary.
The claim appeared in a Dec. 11, 2025 X post (archived here). It read:
🚨 TINA PETERS HAS BEEN FULLY PARDONED!
Thank you, President Trump!
Here's what the post looked like on X at the time this fact check was written:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of post at x.com/VanessaBNews.)
Trump had, on Dec. 11, 2025 said in a post to his Truth Social account (archived here) that he was granting Peters a pardon, writing:
Today I am granting Tina a full Pardon for her attempts to expose Voter Fraud in the Rigged 2020 Presidential Election!
Trump, who continues to claim without judicially accepted evidence that the 2020 election was stolen from him, posted the social media item, but no such pardon or official White House statement about one was found on the White House website.
Using the search term "pardon" turned up (archived here) this list of actions:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of search at www.whitehouse.gov/?s=pardon.)
The White House website search function reported no pardon documents or statements (archived here) in response to the search term "Tina Peters".
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of search results at www.whitehouse.gov/?s=%22Tina+Peters%22.)
As a secondary check, Lead Stories searched the list of executive orders, finding (archived here) no Tina Peters pardon order:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of search results at www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-orders/?s=Peters.)
Trump cannot pardon Peters.
The constitution grants to presidents " ... Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States ..."
But the Library of Congress section (archived here) on Article II, Section II of the Constitution spells out the limits of presidential pardon power as follows:
Despite the breadth of the President's authority under the Pardon Clause, the Constitution's text provides for at least two limits on the power: first, clemency may only be granted for Offenses against the United States, meaning that state criminal offenses and federal or state civil claims are not covered.
Peters was sentenced to nine years in prison for permitting unauthorized access to Mesa County voting machines.
