March 17, 2026 10:00 AM UTC

Federal Judge Shreds Trump's Tina Peters Retaliation Campaign

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• by: Colorado Pols

As Michael Karlik reports for the Colorado Springs Gazette, a federal judge delivered a powerful rebuke to the Trump administration yesterday in a written order halting the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s so-called “pilot project” to hold back millions of dollars in food assistance funds from the state of Colorado, on pretenses so thin that the administration’s true punitive motive is obvious:

In a March 16 written order, [District Court Judge R. Brooke] Jackson elaborated that the USDA’s letter describing the pilot project is “as astonishing as it is brief.”

“Congress established a statutory and regulatory framework to provide households with an orderly, predictable, and fundamentally fair process for periodically demonstrating their continued eligibility for SNAP, including by prescribing a definite certification period, ensuring adequate notice, and permitting telephonic interviews,” he wrote. “The Recertification Letter runs roughshod over these safeguards.”

And then Judge Brooke Jackson spelled it out:

Jackson also situated the USDA’s directive within the federal government’s broader actions toward Colorado in recent months, beginning with President Donald Trump’s pressure for Gov. Jared Polis to release convicted Mesa County clerk Tina Peters, a Trump ally. [Pols emphasis]

“The following week, the Trump Administration launched a barrage of threats and actions designed, by all appearances, to punish Colorado: terminating $109 million in Department of Transportation funds, signaling the cancellation of $615 million in Department of Energy funds, announcing a plan to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, and denying two requests from the State for disaster relief assistance,” wrote Jackson, a Barack Obama appointee. “The December 17th Recertification Letter directing Colorado to participate in the pilot project arrived amid this flurry.”

The judge’s ruling echoes the update in January to a lawsuit filed by Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser over Trump’s decision to move the U.S. Space Command to Alabama, in which Weiser details the vast range of retaliatory actions the Trump administration has taken against Colorado after Trump vowed “harsh measures” if convicted ex-Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters isn’t released from state prison. It was not an idle threat. In a recent interview, Trump made assertions about Peters’ case that were so wildly nonsensical that even her fact-challenged supporters couldn’t repeat them. Despite this, Trump has delivered with interest on his explicit promises to punish Colorado for refusing to carry out his wishes regarding Peters.

What this ruling tells us is that the federal judiciary is very much cognizant of Trump’s corrupt motives, and judges are evaluating the administration’s multitude of adverse actions against our state through that lens. Through this first year of Trump pushing the boundaries of presidential power, in which Colorado has become a first-order target of Trump’s retaliation along with far larger blue states like California and Illinois, the courts have consistently provided relief–and condemned Trump’s abuses in increasingly direct terms.

The moral imperative to resist Trump’s treachery against our state, which the courts are validating every time they are asked, is why Colorado can’t give in.