Nebraska man sentenced to 18 months in prison for threats to Colorado secretary of state

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The guilty plea and sentencing come in one of the first cases brought by a federal task force devoted to protecting elections workers.

By Margery A. Beck, Associated Press

LINCOLN, Neb. — A Nebraska man was sentenced Thursday to 18 months in prison for online threats he made against Colorado’s top elections official, in one of the first cases brought by a federal task force devoted to protecting elections workers nationwide from rising threats.

Travis Ford was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Lincoln, where he lives, after pleading guilty earlier this year 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’s Election Threats Task Force, which was launched last year after the 2020 presidential election, citing the potential effect on democracy of threats against election officials and workers.

Griswold is a national advocate for elections security who has received thousands of threats over her insistence that the 2020 election was secure and that former President Donald Trump’s claims it was stolen from him are false.


More at link:

https://coloradosun.com/2022/10/06/colorado-election-threats-guilty-sentencing-prison

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1. And here's a gift link to a Wapo article

https://wapo.st/3SKVcO9

The Washington Post article also talks about a case in AZ

"The man charged with threats in Arizona was identified Thursday as Mark A. Rissi, 64, of Hiawatha, Iowa. He allegedly left a voice mail for Clint Hickman, chair of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, as an Arizona ballot review — ordered by the Republican-majority state Senate — was coming to close.

“You’re gonna die, you piece of [expletive]. We’re going to hang you. We’re going to hang you,” the indictment said.

Hickman’s experiences were chronicled as part of The Washington Post’s three-part series on the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, which described how threats levied against local election administrators only grew after the violence in Washington.

In an interview Thursday, Hickman, 57, expressed gratitude that an arrest had been made — but said more action was needed."