{"id":679707,"date":"2026-03-25T02:28:20","date_gmt":"2026-03-25T02:28:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/679707\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T02:28:20","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T02:28:20","slug":"court-denies-ags-petition-to-block-republican-sheriffs-investigation-of-seized-ballots","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/679707\/","title":{"rendered":"Court denies AG’s petition to block Republican sheriff\u2019s investigation of seized ballots"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The feud between California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco has escalated after Bonta asked a court to stop Bianco\u2019s investigation into alleged election fraud.<\/p>\n

In a 70-page petition filed with California\u2019s 4th District Court of Appeal on Monday, Bonta wrote that \u201cthe Sheriff\u2019s misguided investigation threatens to sow distrust and jeopardize public confidence\u201d in upcoming elections. The investigation, which he also called \u201csweeping and unprecedented,\u201d is an abuse of the criminal process, he wrote. <\/p>\n

On Tuesday, a three-judge panel denied the petition, stating in a brief ruling that Bonta should apply with a lower court. <\/p>\n

Bianco, who is a leading Republican candidate for governor, last month seized more than 650,000 ballots cast in Riverside County in the November election for Proposition 50, which temporarily redrew the state\u2019s congressional districts to favor Democrats. <\/p>\n

The sheriff has said that his investigators are looking into allegations by a local citizens group that \u201cdid their own audit\u201d and found that the county\u2019s tally was falsely inflated by more than 45,000 votes \u2014 a claim that local election officials have emphatically rejected.<\/p>\n

Bianco has described his inquiry as a \u201cfact-finding mission\u201d to determine whether votes were fraudulently counted. He has accused the attorney general, a Democrat, of improperly interfering with what he says is a lawful criminal investigation.<\/p>\n

In Riverside County, the proposition passed by more than 82,000 votes. Statewide, it passed with about 64% of the vote and a margin of more than 3.3 million ballots<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, well, well, the political corruption in California just gets bigger and bigger,\u201d Bianco said in a social media video Monday night in response to Bonta\u2019s petition. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhy in the world would Rob Bonta want that count stopped unless he was afraid of what that count would uncover?\u201d he added. \u201cWe have an extremely politically biased appeals court, so this is going to be interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement, Bonta\u2019s office said the court\u2019s ruling \u201cwas based solely on where we filed the case and is not a ruling on the underlying merits of the petition.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe facts have not changed. The Riverside County Sheriff continues to directly defy the Attorney General\u2019s instructions, in violation of the California Constitution and state law,\u201d the statement said, adding that the office was \u201cevaluating next steps.\u201d<\/p>\n

Political observers have said that Bianco, an outspoken supporter of President Trump, appears to be vying for attention from Trump, who has called on the federal government to \u201cnationalize\u201d state-run elections, remains fixated on his 2020 election loss and has falsely claimed widespread fraud.<\/p>\n

Kim Nalder, a political science professor and director of the Project for an Informed Electorate at Sacramento State, said Bianco\u2019s investigation appears to be \u201can electoral ploy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAt this stage in the election, most voters haven\u2019t really tuned into the gubernatorial race, and there are a ton of candidates,\u201d she said. \u201cPeople who don\u2019t know his background will know now. This is clear signaling.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sheriff has denied the investigation has anything to do with his campaign. <\/p>\n

A poll released last week<\/a> by UC Berkeley\u2019s Institute of Governmental Studies and co-sponsored by The Times showed Bianco and conservative commentator Steve Hilton leading the crowded field of gubernatorial candidates by slim margins, with the Democratic vote split among multiple candidates in a left-leaning state.<\/p>\n

Bonta\u2019s petition revealed that \u2014 in addition to warrants issued on Feb. 9 and 23 \u2014 the sheriff obtained a third warrant from the Riverside County Superior Court on March 19 to restart a paused recount of the ballots. The warrants now are under seal. <\/p>\n

Bonta\u2019s office called the warrants and the affidavits supporting them legally deficient because \u201cthe Sheriff has not identified any particular crime that may have been committed by anyone \u2014 a necessary predicate to obtain a criminal search warrant.\u201d <\/p>\n

Bonta had earlier questioned whether Bianco had concealed important information from the magistrate judge who approved the warrants.<\/p>\n

In his petition, Bonta wrote that the Sheriff\u2019s Department had planned to assign \u201c12 employees working four days a week, five to seven hours each day\u201d to count the votes.<\/p>\n

David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research and a former senior trial attorney overseeing voting enforcement for the U.S. Department of Justice\u2019s Civil Rights Division, agreed with Bonta\u2019s assessment that the sheriff\u2019s investigation is a legally deficient \u201cfishing expedition.\u201d He questioned how Bianco got a judge to sign off on three warrants.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t use a warrant as a PR tool, as something to help your political campaign,\u201d Becker said. \u201cYou have to meet certain standards in order to obtain a warrant, because a warrant is extraordinary. A warrant is saying we believe there is probable cause to seize evidence, and we need it now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bianco said in a news conference Friday that a Riverside County Superior Court judge had ordered the appointment of a special master to oversee the count. His investigators had already begun counting, but the tally would start over under the court\u2019s guidance, Bianco said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t about counting yes and no votes,\u201d Bianco said in his social media video Monday. \u201cThis is simply counting the total ballots and comparing that total with the number of votes. … Plain and simple. Common sense.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The feud between California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco has escalated after Bonta…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":679708,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[285976,9110,115313,37717,281,3040,19728,37715,5022,26822,50,53628,191889,12498,67,132,68,13235,60834],"class_list":["post-679707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","category-us","tag-70-page-petition","tag-ballot","tag-bianco","tag-bonta","tag-court","tag-department","tag-director","tag-gen-rob-bonta","tag-investigation","tag-last-week","tag-news","tag-probe","tag-riverside-county-sheriff","tag-sheriff","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-vote","tag-warrant"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116287458913883904","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}