Overview: Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco has seized 650K ballots and 425 boxes of related election materials from the 2025 Special Election in response to a claim of election fraud by a right-wing political organization. The claim has been debunked, and CA Attorney General Rob Bonta has filed suit to stop the recount. Bianco’s actions have been criticized as a politically motivated attempt to undermine the integrity of the election process and to discredit the outcome of the CA’s 2025 Special Election. The Riverside organization at the core of Bianco’s efforts is aligned with the right-wing organization United Sovereign Americans, which has been accused of spreading disinformation about mass voter fraud.
S.E. Williams
When Trump acolyte Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco seized the county’s ballots from the 2025 Special Election, many of us thought it was just another dangerous, but classic example of Trump-ignited-political-theater run amuck.
In other words, another failing and clearly ineffective, MAGA inspired politician—Chad Bianco—is seeking to utilize a disingenuous partisan policy currently being leveraged by Republican politicians across the nation, to upend potential results of the 2026 Primary and General Elections. Bianco is seeking to do so by sowing seeds of doubt in Riverside’s election process and the integrity of the Riverside County Registrar of Voters on the one hand while also seeking to disparage the outcome of CA’s 2025 Special Election.
Recently, Bianco seized 650K ballots from the Riverside County Registrar of Voters related to the 2025 Special Election. Last week he went further and seized an additional 425 boxes of related election materials all in response to a questionable and already debunked claim by a right-wing political organization, Riverside Election Integrity Team, who cited a discrepancy between the actual vote count and the number of ballots cast in the 2025 Special Election. The Special Election was centered on Proposition 50 that called for statewide congressional redistricting to offset redistricting efforts in states led by Republicans at the request of Donald Trump. Proposition 50 passed by an overwhelming margin in Riverside County and across the state.
Meanwhile, CA Attorney General Rob Bonta has filed suit challenging Bianco’s claims of election fraud. He filed an emergency petition with the court to stop the wayward sheriff from recounting the seized ballots. A three-judge panel however quickly denied Bonta’s attempt to stop the recount claiming he had not demonstrated why the matter could not be addressed in the Superior Court. In response, the Attorney General’s office noted the ruling had nothing to do with the merits of the petition as it was based strictly on the issue of venue. However, the court further determined the need for a more expanded hearing on the issue. That hearing was scheduled for Monday, March 30.
On Sunday, March 29, News Channel 3 reported the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department had issued a statement that read in part,”We are on hold because of the politically motivated lawsuits and court filings.”
Monday we learned the hearing scheduled for March 30 was delayed to April 2nd.
While this petition remains unresolved, Bonta has also filed a petition with the Superior Court. This petition, according to News Channel 3, seeks a “writ of mandate” with the intent of compelling the sheriff to comply with his directives to cancel or stay the recount.
Bonta has since escalated the issue to the California Supreme Court seeking an intervention in what he stated is an “unprecedented constitutional emergency.”
“In reading The History of Nations, we find that, like individuals, they have their whims and their peculiarities, their seasons of excitement and recklessness, when they care not what they do. We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first.”
Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds
Also, on March 26, the UCLA Voting Rights Project filed a petition with the CA Supreme Court on behalf of voters in the region. The petition seeks a court order that would compel Bianco to return all seized ballots to the Riverside County Registrar of Voters.
It is ludicrous, disingenuous and implausible to take any investigation by Bianco seriously as his history in regards to solving crimes in Riverside County shows he has the worst record in the State of California. In addition, under his stewardship conditions in Riverside County jails remain a haven for violence and death.
Since he obviously can’t solve real crimes, maybe he hopes to have better luck with imaginary crimes–like the imaginary election fraud continuously claimed by his idol, Donald Trump. Obviously, he hasn’t paid much attention to Trump’s failures in this regard.
When announcing his bid for governor Bianco proclaimed, “We need a revolution of competence in government.” To that I say we should begin by pushing for a “revolution of competence” in the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department beginning with community oversight and a new sheriff who will focus on serving the community, not the whims of his orange-faced idol.
This would be a refreshing change from Bianco who seems more committed to brown-nosing for presidential recognition, approval and support. “Hey, notice me,” I can almost hear Bianco screaming at the president, probably hoping for White House kudos in recognition of his fake claims of voter improprieties in Riverside County. Bianco appears to be working overtime to secure his bonafide status as a far-right religious practitioner who has tied himself to pedophile protectors and election deniers.
As the battle over Riverside County’s ballots continue, I hope Bianco experiences the same failure at voter suppression as is being experienced in many places across the nation by Donald Trump and others who appeared aligned with his election fraud strategies.
The Riverside organization at the core of Bianco’s efforts, the Riverside Election Integrity Team, is reportedly aligned with the right wing organization United Sovereign Americans. In 2024, this group acknowledged its intent “to challenge voter rolls across the country, in separate federal court jurisdictions, to force the issue up to the U.S. Supreme Court in time to affect the 2024 general election.” Obviously, this issue fell to the wayside when Trump was re-elected but now that his future is in jeopardy, it is apparent all efforts to suppress voting and/or discredit votes are moving full steam ahead.
Described as a movement “born from disinformation and voter intimidation,” in 2022, the organization described itself as a “non-partisan group of citizens dedicated to restoring and maintaining the essential, founding American principle of sovereignty through honest, provable elections in New York and across the nation.”
In practice, however, in at least one instance, the group has been accused of spreading “disinformation about mass voter fraud throughout the state of New York. The organization further claimed they had conducted their own audit of the records and found “massive irregularities which appear to reflect violations of state and federal law” . . . Sound familiar? This group also pushed similar suits in the states of Maryland and Pennsylvania and possibly others.
The Pennsylvania Department of State denounced United Sovereign American’s lawsuit as “another effort to falsely malign the state’s elections.” The department’s press secretary, noted, “A review shows it to be a frivolous action alleging, without any supporting facts or viable legal theories, a panoply of conspiracy claims advanced by litigants who have repeatedly filed baseless actions rejected by the courts.”
In his work titled Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, author Charles MacKay spoke of an enthusiastic philosopher whose name he did not reveal but who had constructed what MacKay defined as a very satisfactory theory on a particular subject. MacKay noted how the philosopher—not unlike the arrogant Chad Bianco— had a significant amount of pride in his efforts. “But the facts, my dear fellow,” said his friend, “the facts do not agree with your theory.”
We see you, Chad Bianco! We know who you are! As it relates to your seizure of ballots and claims of voter fraud. . . the facts, my dear fellow, do not agree with your theory. Your efforts to control and suppress our votes will not prevail. Just as you will not prevail in your efforts to be elected governor of California.
Of course, this is just my opinion. I’m keeping it real.