{"id":37984,"date":"2022-10-07T20:20:30","date_gmt":"2022-10-08T02:20:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-gets-prison-for-threatening-colorado-secretary-of-state-jena-griswold\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:41:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:41:16","slug":"man-gets-prison-for-threatening-colorado-secretary-of-state-jena-griswold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-gets-prison-for-threatening-colorado-secretary-of-state-jena-griswold\/","title":{"rendered":"Man gets prison for threatening Colorado Secretary of state Jena Griswold"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Colorado's
Colorado's Democratic incumbent Secretary of State Jena Griswold speaks during a news conference Oct. 15, 2020, in Denver. A Nebraska man drew an 18-month prison sentence Thursday for online threats he made last year against Griswold, Colorado\u2019s top elections official, marking one of the first cases brought by a federal task force devoted to protecting elections workers nationwide from a surge in threats. (David Zalubowski\/Associated Press file)<\/span>AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The sentence came the same day an Iowa man was arrested for allegedly leaving voicemail threats for an Arizona official and the Arizona\u2019s Attorney General\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

In Nebraska, Travis Ford was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Lincoln, where he lives. He pleaded guilty earlier this year<\/a> to sending threats to Secretary of State Jena Griswold on social media. It was the first guilty plea obtained by the U.S. Justice Department\u2019s Election Threats Task Force, launched last year after the 2020 presidential contest amid concerns about the potential effect on democracy of threats against election officials and workers.<\/p>\n

A national advocate for elections security, Griswold has received thousands of threats over her insistence the 2020 election was secure despite false claims by former President Donald Trump it was stolen.<\/p>\n

Ford must report to a federal prison Jan. 11 and later complete a year of post-prison supervision.<\/p>\n

Ford told the court Thursday he accepts responsibility for his actions and understands they were wrong. \u201cI\u2019m ashamed, and I\u2019m embarrassed for not only putting myself but my family through this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Griswold said violent threats cannot become an accepted norm.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople who threaten election officials must be held accountable,\u201d her statement said. \u201cThreats are being used to try to intimidate election officials from doing their jobs in an effort to destabilize democracy.<\/p>\n

Attorney General Merrick Garland also released a statement declaring, \u201cThis sentence makes clear that those who illegally threaten election workers should be prepared to face meaningful penalties.\u201d<\/p>\n

Federal prosecutors had sought a two-year prison sentence, citing \u201ca genuine need for general deterrence here.\u201d Investigators discovered Ford made the threats numerous times last year over an Instagram account started by his brother to which Ford gained access. Prosecutors also said Ford made death threats against President Joe Biden and an unspecified technology company CEO. Ford was not charged for those allegations.<\/p>\n

His attorney, Jason Troia, had sought a shorter sentence. He said Ford had a favorable employment record, the threats were out of character and that Ford made them under duress because COVID-19 vaccine mandates fueled his antigovernment sentiment.<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge John M. Gerrard rejected those pleas, saying there\u2019s \u201cnothing special\u201d about being steadily employed and noting Ford made 18 serious threats over three months. He called arguments over vaccine mandates \u201ccomplete nonsense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prosecutors said Ford sent Griswold a series of threatening messages over Instagram in August. One read, \u201cDo you feel safe? You shouldn\u2019t.\u201d Another read: \u201cYour security detail is far too thin and incompetent to protect you. This world is unpredictable these days \u2026 anything can happen to anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Federal officials said there was little to explain why Ford made such threats, noting he has a loving relationship with his family and fianc\u00e9, is in good health and earned a good living.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the government does not currently have reason to believe that defendant will commit similar offenses here in the future, threats to elections workers across the country are an ongoing and very serious problem,\u201d prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

They added one recent survey found one in six election officials have experienced threats because of their job, and 77% said they feel the volume of threats has increased in recent years.<\/p>\n

The judge said he reduced Ford\u2019s sentence to 18 months only because he has no criminal history and his remorse appears genuine.<\/p>\n

Also Thursday, the Justice Department announced the arrest of Mark Rissi, 64, of Hiawatha, Iowa, on suspicion of leaving a voicemail in September 2021 for Republican Maricopa County Supervisor Clint Hickman. Prosecutors say Rissi\u2019s message threatened to lynch Hickman.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis wasn\u2019t a prank call. This wasn\u2019t protected speech. This was a serious threat to me and my family,\u201d Hickman said Thursday in a statement, which called out other Arizona leaders for what he called their silence as election officials endured two years of threats.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors say Rissi left a voicemail weeks later with the Arizona Attorney General claiming the 2020 general election in Arizona was fraudulent and telling prosecutors, \u201cDo your job \u2026 or you will hang with those (expletive) in the end. We will see to it. Torches and pitchforks. That\u2019s your future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Election officials in Arizona and other battleground states have been subjected to threats and intimidation by some Trump supporters since the 2020 election.<\/p>\n

Rissi \u2013 who was to appear in an Iowa federal court Thursday \u2013 faces up to five years in prison if convicted of each of two counts of making a threatening interstate communication and up to two years for a single count of making a threatening telephone call.<\/p>\n

Rissi\u2019s case did not appear in online court records Thursday, and it wasn\u2019t clear whether he yet had an attorney.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado’s Democratic incumbent Secretary of State Jena Griswold speaks during a news conference Oct. 15, 2020, in Denver. A Nebraska man drew an 18-month prison sentence Thursday for online threats he made last year against Griswold, Colorado\u2019s top elections official, marking one of the first cases brought by a federal task force devoted to protecting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37985,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[168,266,28,869,1621],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-37984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-crime","tag-election","tag-headlines","tag-public-officials","tag-voting"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37984"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37984\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83866,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37984\/revisions\/83866"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37984"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=37984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}