July 16, 2025 02:35 PM UTC

Why Is 76 Group Harassing Republican County Clerks?

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• by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: Denver Post’s Seth Klamann:

At least 10 Republican clerks were contacted by consultant Jeff Small, officials said Wednesday. Small, who has Colorado political connections, told the clerks that he was working on the project for the White House and the U.S. departments of Justice and Homeland Security, and he said he wanted the clerks to let an outside party access voting equipment to identify “gaps.”

…All of the clerks contacted by Small rejected the request, election officials said. Unauthorized access to voting equipment is illegal under state law — and for some clerks, the request immediately prompted thoughts that it amounted to the type of conduct that sank former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who’s now serving a prison sentence.

“I’m sitting here going, ‘There’s a person spending nine years in prison here in Colorado for doing the exact same thing,’ ” said Steve Schleiker, the clerk and recorder in El Paso County. [Pols emphasis]

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A story in the Washington Post today about the Trump administration making unusual and in some cases unlawful requests to access election data and even secured election system hardware is raising local eyebrows due to Colorado’s prominence in the story–with an operative for a well-known local Republican consultant group that generally considers itself above the conspiracist fray playing a starring role in the intrigue:

The Trump administration and its allies have launched a multipronged effort to gather data on voters and inspect voting equipment, sparking concern among local and state election officials about federal interference ahead of the 2026 midterms.

The most unusual activity is happening in Colorado — a state that then-candidate Donald Trump lost by 11 points — where a well-connected consultant who says he is working with the White House is asking county clerks whether they will allow the federal government or a third party to physically examine their election equipment…

Although recent elections in Colorado have not been what you’d call competitive with Democrats in near-historic majority control of the legislative and executive branches of government, the fervid imaginations of local election conspiracy theorists combined with the case of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who is serving a nine-year sentence for a failed plot to supply evidence of election fraud through identity theft and official misconduct. After returning to the White House in January, Donald Trump and his Justice Department have taken up Peters’ case as a cause celebre, and Trump demanded her release–which he cannot himself carry out, and no doubt weighs on Trump’s conscience as the only person left in prison over his failed attempt to steal the 2020 presidential election.

As the WaPo continues, the Peters case hangs heavily over recent inquiries from Jeff Small, a former congressional aide for Rep. Lauren Boebert now a principal at the Republican political consultant firm 76 Group started by former state Sen. and flop gubernatorial candidate Josh Penry:

The White House did not answer questions about whether it was working with Jeff Small, the operative who has been contacting Colorado clerks, but said the president is committed to helping states ensure voters on the rolls are citizens.

Republican election officials in Colorado fielded calls and messages last week from Small, a consultant who has worked for members of Congress, most recently serving as chief of staff to Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colorado). Small told more than half a dozen GOP county clerks by phone or text that he was working with the Trump administration to ensure the integrity of elections and to advance Trump’s election agenda, county officials told The Washington Post…

Thankfully, local Republican clerks who have been dealing with conspiracy theorists and misinformation about elections for years, wanted nothing to do with this unlawful and oddly-represented federal fishing trip. After Small contacted clerks variously claiming to represent the Trump administration and/or Trump’s infernal henchman Stephen Miller, they told Small where to stick his request:

“That’s a hard stop for me,” said Carly Koppes, a Republican clerk in Weld County, who said she rejected Small’s overtures to allow a federal inspection. “Nobody gets access to my voting equipment, for security reasons.” [Pols emphasis]

El Paso County Clerk Steve Schleiker denied a similar request from Small to “infiltrate” election equipment under his charge:

Steve Schleiker, the Republican clerk of El Paso County, said Small told him he was working with the Justice and Homeland Security departments to team up with clerks on election security. Soon after their conversation, Schleiker said, he got a call from a Homeland Security official who wanted to review his election equipment.

“We would like to test the voting equipment to see if there’s any gaps,” the official said, according to Schleiker.

Schleiker said the administration had no authority to “try to infiltrate a state’s or a county’s election equipment.”

Again, these are Republican clerks who are wary of the Trump administration sniffing around their voting equipment. It’s not about having anything to hide, it’s about protecting election systems from tampering by outside actors whose motives are deeply suspect. Republican county clerks in Colorado have been on the front lines of combating misinformation about our elections for years before Trump tried to overturn the results in 2020. They were horrified by the security breach Tina Peters carried out with the help of election conspiracy theorists, and have contended with the unfounded allegations and threats that followed against their own offices.

For local observers, this story raises fresh questions about the once-respected 76 Group, previously known as EIS Solutions, one of the principal Republican campaign consultant groups in the state. In 2022, 76 Group worked for the losing campaigns of both U.S. Senate candidate Joe O’Dea and Secretary of State candidate Pam Anderson–both of whom had tried to put distance between themselves and Trump’s stolen election mythology. 76 Group’s founder Josh Penry was once a critic of the Colorado GOP’s lurch rightward over the past two decades.

If 76 Group is now doing Trump’s election denial dirty work in Colorado, that’s a sad fall from something closer to respectability.