The federal appeals court based in Denver agreed on Friday that former Mesa County clerk Tina Peters had not shown why its intervention was warranted in her pending state-level prosecution related to election equipment tampering.

Peters, a Republican who unsuccessfully ran for secretary of state in 2022 and GOP party chair in 2023, is set to face criminal trial in July. The charges center on Peters’ alleged actions as clerk to grant an unauthorized person access to an upgrade of the county’s voting equipment, resulting in videos and confidential passwords later being posted online.

In January, U.S. District Court Judge Nina Y. Wang dismissed Peters’ attempt to halt those proceedings. Peters then turned to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, but a three-judge panel concluded Wang was correct to stay out of the Mesa County criminal trial.

Specifically, elaborated Judge Scott M. Matheson Jr. in a June 21 order, a state judge already found probable cause for the charges against Peters. Further, Peters failed to show District Attorney Daniel P. Rubinstein pursued the prosecution in bad faith allegedly because she spoke out about “vulnerabilities in the County’s computerized voting system.”

“Ms. Peters argues Mr. Rubinstein’s investigation and prosecution was retaliation for her exercise of constitutional rights. She points to several parts of the record,” Matheson wrote, “none of which ‘prove(s) that retaliation was a major motivating factor and played a dominant role in the decision to prosecute.'”

Grand jurors indicted Peters on multiple counts of attempting to influence a public servant, official misconduct and criminal impersonation. Peters subsequently filed suit against Rubinstein in federal court, claiming the prosecution was intended to “punish her” for exercising her constitutional right to inform the public of perceived problems with voting equipment.

In January, Wang declined to insert herself into the criminal case, observing Peters “insists that the Mesa County District Court is an inadequate forum to raise her federal constitutional claims, but has presented no authority that state law prohibits her from doing so.”

Peters appealed to the 10th Circuit, adding a new argument — that her alleged attempts to comply with federal elections law made her immune from state prosecution. Rubinstein countered immunity did not apply and, in any event, Peters had still not shown bad faith on his part.

“To the contrary, her allegations show only that, viewed in a light most favorable to her, Mr. Rubinstein has prosecuted her vigorously, as his office and position requires him to do,” wrote his attorneys.

The 10th Circuit agreed Peters could raise her defenses based on federal law in the criminal proceeding itself. On her remaining allegations that the prosecution is rooted in a desire to harass and punish her, “Ms. Peters provides no basis to infer that Mr. Rubinstein’s exercise of prosecutorial discretion was retaliatory,” Matheson wrote.

The case is Peters v. United States et al.