6 charged with election fraud involved in Colorado GOP candidate's signature-gathering
Attorney General Phil Weiser announced Tuesday that the six individuals, employed by Grassfire, a Wyoming-based petition circulator firm hired by the campaign of Carl Andersen, are charged on counts of attempting to influence a public servant, a class 4 felony, and misdemeanor counts of perjury.
“Colorado’s best-in-class election system depends on individuals playing by the rules and acting with integrity,” Weiser said in a statement. “When candidates, their agents, or others in the process are deceitful and break the rules, they must be held accountable.”
Those charged — Alex Joseph, Terris Kintchen, Patrick Rimpel, Diana Watt, Jordahni Rimpel and Aliyah Moss — were petition circulators for Grassfire.
Andersen, a construction company owner and first-time candidate, attempted to qualify for the 2022 Republican primary ballot in the Jefferson County-based district through petition, but failed to reach the necessary number of signatures after the Secretary of State’s office rejected an “unprecedented number of signatures.”
Andersen’s campaign hired Grassfire, now defunct, to collect the necessary 1,500 signatures to get on the primary ballot.
According to a statement by Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, of the 4,462 signatures on the petition, 3,417 were deemed invalid and rejected.
Almost 2,000 signatures did not match signatures on file for listed voters, 900 names did not appear to be Colorado voters and 21 had died before the date of the signature. There were also numerous names, addresses and signatures that appeared multiple times in different handwriting.
Watt told investigators with the Special Prosecutions Unit of the attorney general’s office that Grassfire circulators cheated and committed fraud in Colorado and that her name is on some petitions that are “very bad,” according to an arrest affidavit.
Watt did not gather signatures for the Andersen campaign but signed another circulator’s petition section when they had to leave the state before getting their signatures notarized, the document said. She claimed the company told her to sign the petitions. She also said she believed the petition circulators had an older voter list that included people who were deceased.
When interviewed by law enforcement, the owners of Grassfire claimed they were not aware of the actions of their employees and did not authorize Watt to sign the petition, according to court documents.
Andersen is not accused of any wrongdoing, and Weiser’s office said that the investigation “found no criminal misconduct by Grassfire.”
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