DENVER — Colorado Gov. Jared Polis confirmed that the state has changed voting machine passwords that were leaked on the state elections website, but those assurances may not be enough to rescue Secretary of State Jena Griswold.
Calls for Ms. Griswold to step down surged Friday after she acknowledged earlier this week that secure passwords for hundreds of voting machines in 63 of 64 counties were included in a spreadsheet posted online.
Her office flagged the breach as early as last week, but did not inform county clerks — or Mr. Polis — until after the Colorado Republican Party revealed Tuesday that the passwords had been available online since at least August, citing an affidavit from a witness whose name has been redacted.
Ms. Griswold has insisted that “this is not a security threat,” saying two passwords are needed to access the machines, as well as being physically present. But the disclosure came as another blot on the Democrat’s error-plagued tenure as the state’s elections chief.
House Minority Leader Rose Pugliese said that while she has “the utmost trust in the integrity of our county clerks, who actually oversee the counting of votes, I have no trust that Secretary Griswold is capable of leading our election system.”
“Enough of her incompetence; it is time for her to resign,” she said in a Wednesday statement on behalf of the House Republicans. “The people of Colorado deserve better.”
The breach also caught the attention of the Trump campaign, which demanded Thursday that the Secretary of State’s office have county clerks install new “Trusted Build” software and rescan all mail ballots already processed.
“[T]his 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,” said Denver attorney Scott Gessler, a former Republican Secretary of State, in a letter on behalf of the Trump for President campaign.
Whether the password updates will satisfy former President Donald Trump is unclear. The Washington Times has reached out to Mr. Gessler for comment.
Just resign, @JenaGriswold…
— Representative Ryan Armagost (@RepRyanArmagost) November 1, 2024
You’ve stepped in it way too deep at this point to shuck your egregious “mistakes” on other people…
Do the honorable thing that a real actual leader would do…
Own it, take accountability and responsibility, and step down…
The world is literally… https://t.co/C6J7lRAJXE
Jimmy Sengenberger, Denver radio host and columnist for the Denver Gazette, said in an op-ed Friday that the password breach is “part of a six-year history of blunders and broken promises under Secretary Jena Griswold’s watch.”
Her biggest gaffe came in 2020 when her office mistakenly sent voter registration postcards to 30,000 noncitizens—and then did it again in 2022. She cited a database snafu with the state driver’s license system, which makes licenses available to illegal immigrants and other noncitizens.
Ms. Griswold said the latest glitch was made by an employee who no longer works for the office. Several top state officials have called for an investigation, but she told 9News that the only review currently underway is being conducted by her office.
Former Arapahoe County District Attorney George Brauchler, a Republican candidate for Douglas County district attorney, called on Mr. Polis on Friday to appoint independent prosecutors to investigate.
“If Jared Polis does not order an investigation, it can only be due to partisan politics,” he wrote in a Gazette op-ed. “It will look and smell like a cover-up, and Colorado voters will have reason to mistrust our voting system and to blame the Democrats for it.”
The Democratic governor swooped in after the mistake became public, bringing in “human capital, air and ground assets,” including 22 state cybersecurity personnel, to help the Secretary of State’s office switch out the passwords.
“This password disclosure did not pose a security threat to Colorado’s elections, nor will it impact how ballots are counted,” said the governor’s office. “Changes to passwords were made out of an abundance of caution.”
Ms. Griswold thanked the governor in a statement for “deploying extra state resources to help in this effort.”
“Colorado has countless layers of security to ensure our elections are free and fair, and every eligible voter should know their ballot will be counted as cast,” she said in a Friday statement.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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