Trial in voter intimidation lawsuit against Colorado election deniers to begin

The U.S. District Court of Colorado on Monday is set to begin hearing arguments in a voter intimidation lawsuit brought by a coalition of civil rights groups against a trio of Colorado-based election conspiracy theorists.

The lawsuit alleges that defendants Ashe App, Shawn Smith and Holly Kasun violated federal civil rights laws by organizing what they called “voter verification canvassing” efforts in the wake of the 2020 election, in an attempt to substantiate debunked claims that the election was stolen from former President Donald Trump.

The Colorado NAACP, the League of Women Voters of Colorado and Mi Familia Vota, represented by attorneys from the liberal nonprofit Free Speech For People, allege that this “intimidating, threatening, and coercive conduct” violates the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Enforcement Act of 1871 — also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act, for the white supremacist paramilitary group it targeted in the post-Civil War era.

Epp and Kasun are co-founders of U.S. Election Integrity Plan, which organized the door-to-door “verification” drives in Colorado and several other states. Smith, who has frequently associated with the group, was part of a pro-Trump mob that clashed with police outside the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 insurrection and has said that those involved in election fraud “deserve to hang.”

“USEIP agents, wearing badges that identify themselves as official-sounding groups such as the ‘Voter Integrity Committee,’ and sometimes introducing themselves in ways that make voters believe that they are associated with government agencies, are using public voter lists to target and intimidate voters,” read the initial complaint, filed in March 2022. “USEIP agents ask residents to confirm their address, question residents about their participation in the 2020 election and their method for voting, and either ask them about allegedly fraudulent ballots or accuse them of casting allegedly fraudulent ballots.”

Witness lists submitted by the parties in the case on Friday indicate that the defendants and representatives of the plaintiff groups may take the stand during the trial, along with Chris Beall, Colorado’s deputy secretary of state, voting-rights experts and a handful of other prominent “election integrity” conspiracy theorists, including Douglas Frank and Jeff Young.

Claims that the 2020 election was fraudulent or compromised have been debunked by elections officials, experts, media investigations, law enforcement, the courts and Trump’s own campaign and administration officials.

The intimidation case marks the second time in a year that high-profile litigation invoking laws enacted to confront ex-Confederate elements during Reconstruction has gone to trial in Denver.

In October, a lawsuit brought by six Colorado voters in state court alleged that Trump was disqualified from seeking office under the so-called insurrection clause of the 14th Amendment, and therefore couldn’t be placed on Colorado’s presidential ballot. The case ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled unanimously against the plaintiffs and barred states from enforcing the clause against candidates for federal office.