This story by Quentin Young appeared on Colorado Newsline on November 3, 2022
At least two Colorado district attorney offices are looking into matters presented by volunteers of an activist group that last year conducted a voter canvassing effort intended to demonstrate that the results of the 2020 election were compromised.
The group, U.S. Election Integrity Plan, issued a report in March that claimed the “irregularities and issues” uncovered in the canvassing effort necessitated a statewide investigation of the election, including a full forensic audit.
Volunteers reportedly went door-to-door interviewing voters in Weld, Douglas, El Paso and Pueblo counties, and the affidavits were completed to document each alleged irregularity.
“Affidavits and accompanying data will be provided to officials,” the report said.
Newsline inquired with the district attorney offices that cover each of the four counties targeted by USEIP about whether affidavits from the canvassing effort had been submitted to them and, if so, the status of those submissions.
“This is an active investigation,” Howard Black, a spokesperson for the Fourth Judicial District attorney in El Paso County, wrote in an email. “No additional information will be released at this time.”
“We are in receipt of these affidavits. They’re currently under review,” Krista Henery, the Weld County District Attorney’s Office spokesperson, said, adding she could not comment further.
A spokesperson for the 18th Judicial District attorney, who covers Douglas County, said that office had not received affidavits from USEIP volunteers. A representative from the Pueblo DA had not responded to several inquiries by the time of publication.
Claims that the 2020 election was fraudulent or compromised have been debunked by experts, courts and former President Trump’s own campaign and administration officials. Democratic and Republican election officials in Colorado have repeatedly affirmed the integrity of 2020 election results in the state.
The identity of the individuals who submitted the affidavits and exactly what the affidavits claim to show about the 2020 election is unclear. The USEIP canvassing report said that among the kinds of irregularities volunteer canvassers claimed to have detected, the category “election law violation” — including purported instances of ballots being counted from voters who did not actually live at their voting address — had the highest frequency. “The counting of illegitimate ballots not only deprives the rights of Colorado citizens and dilutes their sacred vote, but it also is in violation of state law,” the report says.
Holly Kasun, a USEIP co-founder, said in an interview the affidavits were intended to be submitted to state authorities, but individual volunteers with the group had the option of pursuing local action by submitting a subset of the affidavits to their county clerk or district attorney.
Kasun said she was not aware that district attorney offices were reviewing or investigating the matters related to the canvassing effort. But, she said, “I’m glad to hear that.”
“It’s showing that the process is working,” Kasun said. “It also shows that they’re upholding their constitutional duty to investigate crimes and issues if they’re notified of actual evidence.”
USEIP and three of its organizers, including Kasun, were sued in federal court over the canvassing effort in March by three civil rights organizations — the Colorado NAACP, the League of Women Voters of Colorado and Mi Familia Vota. The organizations alleged the canvassing effort amounted to a “voter intimidation campaign” in violation of the Ku Klux Klan Act.
One of the organizers, Shawn Smith, is an influential Colorado election denier who heads the nonprofit Cause of America, which is funded by former President Donald Trump ally and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell with the goal of coordinating national “election integrity” activities. He did not respond to emailed questions about submission of affidavits to local authorities. But he has publicly alluded to submitting affidavits from the canvassing effort to the Weld County clerk.
Kasun said in a follow-up text that Smith told her the affidavits were submitted to the office of Attorney General Phil Weiser on about Oct. 20. But a Weiser spokesperson told Newsline this week the AG’s office had not received “affidavits or materials from USEIP alleging voting irregularities.”
Smith has frequently claimed to have submitted election crime-related affidavits to Weiser’s office or other Colorado law enforcement officials.