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Media coalition seeks to unseal records in Riverside County sheriff’s election probe

April 1, 2026

The Southern California News Group joined a coalition of media outlets Wednesday, April 1, in going to court to unseal search warrants and other documents related to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department’s investigation of ballots cast in the county during November’s special election.

In a Riverside Superior Court filing on Wednesday, April 1, media attorneys wrote that the public’s right to know more about about the probe outweighs any argument to keep the warrants and other documents under seal.

The coalition wants to unseal “all documents and records relating” to the investigation’s three search warrants as well as supporting documents for those warrants and “any other judicial records in this matter,” the filing read.

Media outlets seeking the unsealed records include the California Newspapers Partnership, a Delaware company that includes this publication and dozens of others throughout California.

“If there is evidence of wrongdoing or vote tampering, there should absolutely be an investigation. But that investigation should be conducted openly and transparently so that the public can be confident in the security and integrity of our elections,” said Frank Pine, executive editor of the Southern California News Group and the Bay Area News Group.

Other members include ABC News, CalMatters, CBS News, Fox Television Stations, KCRA/KQCA in Central California, the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today and The Riverside Record.

Sheriff Chad Bianco on Monday, March 30, said the investigation is “on hold because of the politically motivated lawsuits and court filings.” The probe comes as Bianco is running as a Republican for governor this year.

The coalition “takes no position” on the legal arguments in the dispute between Bianco, California Attorney General Rob Bonta and other parties opposed to the investigation, the filing states.

“Whoever is right, the law is clear that the documents and records relating to the search warrants must be made public,” the filing argued.

The attorney general and sheriff have already publicly characterized various aspects of the investigation, negating the argument that unsealing the records would cause harm, the media lawyers argue.

“Protections for privileged information are limited by their purpose: once the privileged information is made public, ‘the privilege is no longer applicable,’” the filing read.

The public “should not be forced to navigate” the “competing allegations” about the investigation “without the facts on which the Investigation is based,” the coalition’s lawyers wrote.

“Nor does the law require them to. Not only must the search warrant materials be disclosed, all judicial records regarding this matter must be unsealed consistent with the California Constitution, the common law, and Rules of Court.”

Bianco’s investigation, described by Bonta as unprecedented in state history, stems from California’s Proposition 50 special election in November.

A majority of California voters, including 56% in Riverside County, approved a ballot measure that redrew the state’s congressional districts to help Democrats gain seats in the House of Representatives.

The Riverside Election Integrity Team, a citizen’s election watchdog group, said it conducted an election audit and found a roughly 45,000-vote gap between ballots cast and ballots counted in Riverside County during the election.

On Feb. 10 — a day after Bianco’s office secured the first of three search warrants in the case — Riverside County Registrar of Voters Art Tinoco gave a presentation to the county Board of Supervisors in which he refuted the watchdog group’s audit.

According to Tinoco, the group “relied on raw, interim, and imprecise data to estimate the number of votes cast, instead of relying on the number of cast ballots actually logged into the tracking system after verification,” the attorney general’s office wrote in legal papers.

The actual gap between ballots counted and ballots cast, according to Tinoco, is just 103 votes, well within the acceptable margin of error set by California’s secretary of state, which oversees elections.

Despite Tinoco’s assertions, the sheriff obtained search warrants from Riverside County Superior Court for the county’s Proposition 50 ballots and related election materials.

The last warrant, executed March 24, allowed the department to seize 426 boxes of election materials. That was in addition to about 1,000 boxes seized from earlier warrants.

In a March 20 news conference, Bianco said his office, under the watch of a court-appointed special master, would count all the ballots to see if any gap like the one described by the election integrity team exists.

If it doesn’t, the case is closed, Bianco said. If a gap is found, the sheriff, who is elected to his post, said his department would try to find out why.

That reasoning doesn’t fly with Bonta, an elected Democrat whose office is already investigating Bianco’s department for alleged civil rights violations, a probe Bianco dismissed as partisan politics.

Affidavits in support of the sheriff’s search warrants “did not identify any specific felony offense the Sheriff had probable cause to believe had been committed or that a particular person had committed a felony” as required by law, Bonta’s office argued in court filings.

The attorney general also accuses the sheriff of defying his directives to stand down and coordinate with his office on the investigation. Bonta argued that the state constitution gives him authority over sheriffs.

The sheriff and attorney general are publicly feuding over the investigation, with Bianco calling Bonta “an embarrassment to law enforcement” and “more of a political activist than a prosecutor” while accusing the attorney general of interfering in a lawful investigation.

In court papers, Bianco’s lawyer, Robert Tyler, wrote that the sheriff’s department believes “the totality of the circumstances” and evidence presented to get the search warrants “shows that there is a fair probability that evidence of a crime is located in the total ballot count” and related documents.

Superior Court Judge Jay Kiel, who signed the warrants, “retains continuing jurisdiction and control over the seized ballots and materials because the Sheriff’s possession is custodial and ‘subject to the order of the court,’” Tyler added.

The investigation faces several court challenges. In separate cases, Bonta has gone to the California Supreme Court and superior court to halt the probe and force Bianco to comply with the attorney general’s directives in the matter.

Bianco’s investigation also is being challenged by the UCLA Voting Rights Project, which is asking the supreme court to order him to return the seized ballots to the registrar of voters.

Orange County Register

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Media coalition seeks to unseal records in Riverside County sheriff’s election probe

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