California's state Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a Republican sheriff must hand back more than half a million ballots he confiscated for an inquiry into unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud during a special election last year.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco in February seized roughly 650,000 ballots from a November 2025 special election regarding statewide congressional redistricting that favored Democrats and was championed by Gov. Gavin Newsom. The measure comfortably passed across the state and won in Bianco's county by about 80,000 votes.
