California Republican sheriff Chad Bianco must return more than 650,000 ballots his department confiscated earlier this year in an unprecedented move that violated election law, a state supreme court ruled on Thursday. During a November 2025 special election, California voters passed Proposition 50, a redistricting amendment designed to counteract Republican-led gerrymandering in Texas. The measure easily passed statewide, and won in Bianco’s Riverside county by roughly 80,000 votes.
After the election, a county citizen activist group claimed there was a discrepancy in the total vote count. Local election officials have said the complaint was unfounded. The Riverside county sheriff’s department launched an inquiry into the fraud claims, obtaining search warrants to assume custody of the ballots and other election materials.
Democratic attorney general Rob Bonta immediately launched a legal challenge, arguing Bianco had no authority over election materials and warning the seizure was designed to sow distrust in elections. He ordered Bianco to return the ballots, but Bianco did not. In court, Bianco’s attorneys argued the top prosecutor could not give directions to a sheriff about an active investigation.
As we have explained, that is not the case,” Guerrero wrote in a separate Thursday ruling. California governor Gavin Newsom praised the court’s decision. Bianco’s ballot investigation came as Donald Trump has repeatedly disputed the results of the 2020 election, citing unsubstantiated instances of fraud.
His administration in January seized ballots and other documents from an election office in Georgia. Some Republicans have mirrored Trump’s rhetoric on voting in their states. Election officials and civil rights groups have been following the Bianco case carefully as they brace for the possibility that Trump or his allies may try to seize ballots in November.
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