{"id":42366,"date":"2022-02-04T15:23:58","date_gmt":"2022-02-04T22:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorados-top-election-official-demands-answers-from-third-gop-county-clerk-on-alleged-election-server-copying\/"},"modified":"2022-02-04T22:23:58","modified_gmt":"2022-02-04T22:23:58","slug":"colorados-top-election-official-demands-answers-from-third-gop-county-clerk-on-alleged-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorados-top-election-official-demands-answers-from-third-gop-county-clerk-on-alleged-election\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado\u2019s top election official demands answers from third GOP county clerk on alleged election server copying"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Election
Election officials process ballots for the 2020 election at the Douglas County Office of the Clerk and Recorder in Castle Rock on Oct, 30, 2020. (Kevin Mohatt\/Special to The Colorado Sun)<\/span>Kevin Mohatt\/Special to The Colorado Sun<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold on Thursday ordered Douglas County Clerk Merlin Klotz to answer questions and turn over information about a copy of his county\u2019s election system that was allegedly made.<\/p>\n

Klotz is one of three Republican county clerks being investigated by Griswold\u2019s office for making copies of their election system hard drives.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy office became aware of a potential unauthorized imaging of a Douglas County voting equipment server,\u201d Griswold, a Democrat, said in a written statement. \u201cThe Douglas County Clerk has failed to respond to an email request requiring disclosure of information about this potential breach in election security protocol. To ensure the security of Douglas County\u2019s voting equipment, I am issuing an Election Order requiring the Douglas clerk to disclose information regarding the imaging of the election equipment server.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Secretary of State\u2019s Office began investigating after finding a statement attributed to Klotz in a social media post on the conservative website Telegram stating that he had made a copy of an election server before a software update was performed last year.<\/p>\n

Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters and Elbert County Clerk Dallas Schroeder are also being investigated by Griswold\u2019s office for allegedly making unauthorized copies of election system servers.<\/p>\n

Klotz, Schroeder and state Rep. Ron Hanks, R-Fremont County, sued Griswold in November claiming that the election system software used in Colorado in 2020 was improperly certified and that the Secretary of State\u2019s Office illegally destroyed election records.<\/p>\n

Griswold has strongly denied the claims, saying they are based on debunked conspiracy theories.<\/p>\n

Various social media posts made on Klotz\u2019s Facebook account have pushed debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. One post on Dec. 18, 2020, asserted that former Vice President Mike Pence had the power on Jan. 6 to declare election results in Arizona, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and other states illegal \u2013 a claim that helped spark the Jan. 6, 2020, riot at the U.S. Capitol by supporters of former President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

The questions Griswold wants Klotz to answer include whether he has been in contact with MyPillow CEO and election conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell about the imaging of voting equipment, and what other elected officials in the state he has spoken with about copying election system equipment.<\/p>\n

Klotz declined to speak to The Colorado Sun in detail about the matter when reached Thursday, citing the pending lawsuit. But he did tell the Sun that \u201cthere are some issues I feel very strongly need to be addressed.\u201d<\/p>\n

John Case, an attorney for Klotz, told the Sun that Griswold is \u201cinitiating a persecution of everybody involved in this lawsuit against her\u201d when the clerks were \u201cjust doing their job, trying to preserve election records.\u201d<\/p>\n

Case said he wasn\u2019t entirely sure what Klotz had done related to making a backup of an election system server, and that he still had to talk with him about it. However, he said Schroeder did make a copy, adding, \u201cI know Dallas (Schroeder) didn\u2019t do anything illegal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe clerk is charged with administering the voting system and maintaining it,\u201d Case said. \u201cHe is allowed to copy what\u2019s on that server. He\u2019s responsible for preserving those records for 25 months. That\u2019s his job.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Secretary of State\u2019s Office said that because the copying took place before the software update, officials do not believe \u201cthat the unauthorized imaging has created an imminent or direct security risk to Colorado\u2019s elections.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Colorado Sun is a reader-supported, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to covering Colorado issues. To learn more, go to coloradosun.com.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Douglas County clerk is under investigation by state<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":42367,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-42366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42366\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42366"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=42366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}