Gavin Newsom spent $120 million to gerrymander California's congressional map and handed Democrats five House seats.
Now a Republican sheriff wants to count the ballots from that election.
And California's attorney general is trying to stop him.
The 45000 Votes Nobody Can Explain
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco seized over 650,000 ballots from the November 2025 special election on Proposition 50 – the Newsom-engineered gerrymander that rewrote California's congressional districts to flip five Republican seats.
The seizure came after a citizens' watchdog group called the Riverside Election Integrity Team conducted their own audit and found a staggering discrepancy: handwritten ballot logs recorded roughly 45,800 fewer votes than the total certified to the state.
Bianco didn't accuse anyone of fraud – not yet.
"I'm not saying anyone is lying, or there's a series of mistakes," he said at a Friday press conference. "I'm saying I don't know."
He made his demand sound almost reasonable: "This investigation is simple: Physically count the ballots and compare that result with the total votes recorded."
County Registrar Art Tinoco has a different explanation.
He told county supervisors that handwritten intake logs are rough estimates completed by temporary polling workers during long shifts – never intended as a precise count.
The official machine count, he says, was certified with a discrepancy of just 103 votes – 0.16% of ballots cast.
That's his story, and he's sticking to it.
Bonta Moves to Shut It Down
California Attorney General Rob Bonta spent two months writing letters demanding Bianco stand down.
His letters warned the sheriff's staff is unqualified to conduct a recount and called the ballot seizure "unacceptable" – a move that would "only sow distrust in our elections."
Bianco had a direct answer.
"What does sow mistrust in our system is failing to conduct an investigation – or worse, attempting to stop or interfere with a lawful investigation to sweep it under the rug so evidence can possibly be destroyed," he said.
He called the attorney general's outrage "extremely concerning" and labeled Bonta "an embarrassment to law enforcement."
A judge has since appointed a special master to supervise the count.
What Democrats Are Actually Protecting
Proposition 50 was Newsom's gerrymandering scheme – and he admitted it openly.
The stated purpose was to cancel out the Texas redistricting Trump had backed to gain Republican House seats.
Non-partisan analysts called it an "aggressive Democratic gerrymander" that would more than double the partisan bias already in California's congressional map.
The measure passed 64% statewide, bankrolled by $120 million from Newsom's war chest – including money from George Soros' Fund for Policy Reform and the House Majority PAC.
In Riverside County, it passed by over 80,000 votes.
Now a county sheriff wants to verify those numbers are real.
The Democratic establishment's response isn't to welcome the scrutiny.
It's cease-and-desist letters, attacks on the sheriff's competence, and calling the investigation itself a threat to democracy.
That's not confidence in clean elections.
That's a power structure protecting results it can't afford to have examined.
Bianco is currently running neck-and-neck with fellow Republican Steve Hilton at 16-17% each in the California governor's race – a position no Republican has held in this state in years.
Now TWO Republicans could upend it all despite the state’s “Top Two Candidates” open primary system, which for decades has virtually guaranteed a Democrat victory in every major race.
That’s how sick and tired Californians have gotten of Gavin Newsom’s politics as usual.
And to top it all off, Democrats are watching the man who seized their most important electoral prize potentially march his way to the governor's office.
They want this buried.
The count is happening anyway.
Sources:
- Anders Hagstrom, "California Sheriff Seizes 650,000 Ballots in Defiance of State Officials Over Election Count Dispute," Fox News, March 22, 2026.
- "Bianco Gives Update on Election Investigation, Accuses AG Bonta of Interference," The Riverside Record, March 21, 2026.
- "Riverside County Sheriff Investigates 2025 Special Election, Citing Discrepancy in Number of Votes," ABC7 Los Angeles, March 20, 2026.
- "2025 California Proposition 50," Wikipedia, updated 2026.
- "California 2026 Poll: Hilton, Swalwell, Bianco Lead Nonpartisan Primary for Governor," Emerson College Polling, February 2026.
- "Republican Candidates Hilton and Bianco Lead California Governor Poll," ABC10/UC Berkeley IGS, March 2026.
