When Chad Bianco, the sheriff of California’s Riverside County, seized more than 650,000 ballots from the state’s 2025 redistricting referendum, it raised some big questions.
Why was a county sheriff investigating a state special election based upon a little-known activist group’s claims of a discrepancy between ballots cast and ballots counted?
A look at a LinkedIn profile in Bianco’s name may offer some clues.
“That’s why some people should never be allowed to vote,” the sheriff wrote Wednesday in response to a commentary video about the Iran war on the social media site.
It wasn’t an isolated comment. Over the past months, Bianco published numerous comments and posts on social media promoting false claims that elections are rigged and Democrats rely on illegal voters to win races.
In doing so, he has echoed narratives pushed by President Donald Trump and other MAGA-aligned GOP figures that have been repeatedly rejected by courts, election officials and audits across the country.
Bianco did not immediately reply to a request for comment on his social media posts.
Democrats have “created an environment where cheating and illegal voting is keeping them in office,” Bianco wrote in another comment.
“Why would they be scared if they aren’t illegal? Illegals shouldn’t be voting!,” he wrote in reply to warnings by voting rights advocates that placing immigration agents near polls would intimidate eligible voters.
Bianco has also pushed election denial rhetoric on social...
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