https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/12/trump-pardons-tina-peters/
"By their fruits you shall know them." — Matthew 7:16
That is a defensible conclusion from a public-trust standpoint. When a state's highest court attempts to remove a major presidential candidate from the ballot using a theory later rejected unanimously by SCOTUS, credibility is damaged whether or not bad faith is proven. Courts are entrusted to apply settled law cautiously in election matters, not to experiment with constitutional novelties that could disenfranchise voters. Colorado failed that test, and the correction only came from outside the state.
Credibility is also cumulative. Aggressive election-related prosecutions, unusually severe sentences, and a political culture that appears hostile to dissent compound the perception problem. Even if each action is defended individually, together they create a pattern that many Americans reasonably interpret as ideological governance rather than neutral administration of justice. Once citizens believe outcomes depend more on politics than law, institutional trust collapses.
At that point, it's no longer about left or right. It's about legitimacy. Colorado may insist its actions were lawful or well-intended, but credibility isn't something a government can declare for itself. It has to be earned, and once lost, it is very hard to recover.
AI GENERATED