Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco is suspending his investigation into election fraud
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a Republican gubernatorial candidate, said Monday he has suspended his controversial investigation into unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud, an investigation that faces mounting legal challenges and ethical concerns.
In a statement on Monday, Bianco said the investigation was “on hold” due to “politically motivated charges and claims filed in court.”
It was a major shift for a staunch Trump supporter, who had defended the investigation — and expanded its scope — last week. Bianco’s staff captured more than 650,000 votes in Riverside County during the November election.
Bianco did not comment beyond the press release or say when the investigation might be reopened.
Since it began, Bianco’s investigation has drawn widespread concern from election watchers and federal law enforcement officials, including California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta. The state’s attorney general has ordered the sheriff to suspend his investigation and has filed a series of legal challenges asking for judicial intervention to ensure that Bianco does so.
In a state Supreme Court petition filed Friday, Bonta called the case an “unprecedented constitutional emergency” and asked the court to immediately halt Bianco’s investigation.
A spokesman for the attorney general’s office on Monday acknowledged that Bianco said he would drop the investigation — but said the office is still focused on what the sheriff did, not what he said.
“We are continuing to proceed in the Supreme Court of California and Riverside [County] Superior Court to ensure compliance with our orders and the return of these ballots” to the Riverside County registrar of voters, the spokesman said in a statement.
In his lawsuit, Bonta argued that Bianco failed to identify specific crimes in the warrants to justify the confiscation of votes. The lawsuit also says “the sheriff’s flawed investigation threatens to sow distrust and jeopardize public confidence in the upcoming primary and national elections, not just in Riverside County but across the state.”
But Bianco previously revealed that his department had obtained warrants “authorized and signed by a judge” to seize election materials. The warrants remain under seal, although the attorney general said he has reviewed them.
Bianco described the investigation as necessary “to establish the veracity of allegations of electoral fraud” raised by a group of local citizens who conducted their own investigation. This group claims that the number of the district has been increased by more than 45,000 votes. County election officials have vehemently denied those claims.
The votes in question are from the November election on Proposition 50, which has redrawn state districts in favor of Democrats in response to the redistricting of Republican states, including Texas.
The UCLA Voting Rights Project filed an appeal with the California Supreme Court arguing that all ballots must remain in the custody of the county registrar of voters under state law.
Bonta also raised privacy concerns about ballots left in the voter registrar’s custody, saying mail ballots “contain confidential information, particularly voter signatures, and are strictly protected from disclosure by California law.”
Times staff writer Hailey Branson-Potts contributed to this report.
