Chad Bianco explains why he should be California’s next governor | California Politics 360
Sheriff Chad Bianco, thank you so much for making time for us. You’re welcome, very happy to be here. This is *** hard job at *** very hard time. Why do you want to be California governor now? That’s an amazing question, uh, especially how you phrased it, because somebody has to do it. And somebody has to do it to make *** drastic change. It’s the last thing California needs is the status quo, uh, maybe that might be the, that’s the last thing they need right now. The worst thing is worse, and I watched everyone signing up to be the next governor and I listened to people talking about wanting to be the next governor and I knew. Enough about them and their past to know that California is not going to get better and I was told *** long time ago about promotions if you don’t promote somebody else will and you never know who that person is going to be and the supervisor that told me that made me fill out an application for for promotion and that changed it really changed my trajectory it changed my life and I’ve changed *** lot of other people’s lives in my in my organization because of that. And I look at it like I, I came to California for the best life possible, and I truly do believe I achieved it, and I unfortunately now have kids that are looking elsewhere for theirs because they, they can’t afford to buy *** house, they can’t afford gas, they can’t afford groceries, they, they know they will probably never get *** house. Their rent payment is almost double my house payment and they they know that they can’t afford private school and they’re not going to send their kids to California public school and so they’re looking for other states that offer them that chance to make *** good life for themselves and their family and it hurts my feelings because my life. California was my chance to make *** better life, and I feel like in my short time here, it’s been 38 years, but. It all changed. And while I was making *** good life for myself, the opportunity for this generation and my grandkids has been taken away and it’s not taken away because of Californians and businessmen and corporations and and small businesses, manufacturing workers, anything like that it was taken away only because of absolutely horrific bad policy and it’s policy that could be easily changed if we had people of character in office. That would admit that they were wrong and change direction and change paths, and ultimately is no one’s going to do that, so I have to be the one to do it. Well, at the core of this job is obviously figuring out how to use taxpayer money and right now, given some of the challenges that you laid out, the state is in *** situation where the next governor is going to have to decide whether to cut programs, raise taxes, or do *** combination of both. What would *** governor, Chad Bianco do? Only *** Democrat is going to have to raise taxes. Uh california is the 4th largest economy in the world, in the world. Don’t tell me we have to raise taxes. We have more money than we could ever imagine spending hundreds of billions of dollars. The, the, the, the normal person, I don’t even think the elite and the economists have an idea of what *** billion dollars really is. It, it’s astronomical, and we have hundreds of billions of dollars in budget. We don’t have *** money problem. California has never had *** money problem. We have *** massive spending problem. They’re talking now about. Historical highs in revenue and we what do we have *** $30 billion deficit. We don’t have *** money problem. We have *** massive, massive, massive government spending problem. So you’re cutting programs. I’m, I don’t know if I would say cutting programs. I’m, I’m gonna, we can, I think we can all possibly agree just from the last two months that I guarantee *** quarter of our budget is fraud. I guarantee it. I guarantee it. That we could find $50 billion *** year in fraud. Any thoughts on like which specific departments? It’s every single department. I think we’re learning that. I think that we’re learning that it isn’t one, it isn’t just homeless now. It’s medical. Now it’s, it’s going to the DMV. I mean, I’m not going to say that anyone or any agency is is immune and exempt from it because we are seeing that. What we are learning is there is absolutely no one watching where our money goes. No one cares. No one cares. I don’t, it’s, it’s almost like from the beginning of time we’ve been, government has been paying for things and we never stop paying for them. We just keep adding more on. And instead of stopping that money from going or stopping something that’s not working or changing it and getting rid of it, cutting it, we just keep it going and then tax you more or increase fees for something else so we can have *** new pet project and it’s gotta stop. My, my opinion, my belief is that California is run by activism. It’s and I will, I will say. Activism has its place. Activism is supposed to be on the outside. The activists can all yell and they can they can scream and demand their their things and everything else, but adults are supposed to be in the in the middle and we’re supposed to be making decisions that benefit everyone, not the activists. And so California lost that *** long time ago. We have activists and activists attorneys that sit on every board that run everything in California. Uh, the ACLU, whether, uh, here’s *** story for you, the ACLU runs Sacramento, and the ACLU, the founders of the ACLU will roll over in their grave. Of what the ACLU has turned into, it is nothing but activism. It’s extremist activism. So how would *** Governor Bianco then root out fraud and and figure out some of these spending issues that you say are there? Like what specifically would you do? So first we have to go back to what government’s responsibility is anyway, and government has priorities, and priorities are where you spend your money. And California’s priorities are completely upside down. If you’re going to, I mean, call it *** pyramid of what government’s number one responsibility is and then go down, ours is backwards. It’s completely upside down, uh, no matter what the number one role of any government, federal or state, is public safety. The federal government keeps us safe from foreign invaders and local government keeps us safe from criminals and from natural disasters. Fire gets added into that, so police and fire is the number one responsibility of government and if you’re not keeping people healthcare, education, no, no, that is, no, that has never been education is number 31, number 1 is priority, number 1 priority, we’re not gonna have *** great education system if no one’s safe in school. We’re not going to have ***, ***, you can’t have, you can’t even have *** good economic environment if everyone’s afraid to go to the store or you’re afraid to go to the restaurant or you’re afraid to go buy something because someone’s going to follow you home and home invasion or rob you in your driveway when you get out of your car, but I’m just saying logistically California’s state budget, 40% of it by state law has to go to K-12 education, and I mean public safety is still *** significant part of. Education is your number 3. So, so just to clarify then, Governor Bianco would state law, you’ll change the state law. You go back to the voters on how much money goes to education, absolutely, because there’s no way should it be 40%. How much should it be? *** whole lot less than that. And, and, and I’ll tell you, it’s, it’s, where is the money being spent. Half of the money being spent is above the principal level, we can eliminate that entire thing. Why do we need, why do we need half of our money in education going to people that have absolutely nothing to do with teaching kids how to read, write, or do math? Our state leaders right now would tell you that money is going to our local school districts that have to teach millions of children in the state. Would you spend more on public safety than education? Um, no, I said it’s priorities. It’s you, you have to have priorities. Our priority of public safety left *** long time ago. It left in 2012 with AB 109. That was the downfall of public safety in California and that’s why we see what we see here today with, with crime being enabled by the people in Sacramento, enabled by our governor. Complete failure. AB 109 was an absolute failure. It was, it was the downfall of public safety. The nail in the coffin was Prop 47 and Prop 57. And then there’s been hundreds of laws since then that have just been, it’s piling dirt on the coffin is what it was, and all of those have to be reversed. AB 109 has to be completely reversed. If you’re elected governor, you’d be working with likely *** supermajority Democratic legislature. Do you think there’d be an appetite to actually execute that and get that done? Uh, I know there will be if they want to stay in office. The only thing that *** politician fears is an informed voter. And I’m going to make sure that Californians are informed because we’ve been kept in the dark so what happens in Sacramento has been in the dark for decades. Decades and the shutters need to flip open and the the blinds raised on our beautiful building and everyone needs to see what they’re doing behind closed doors and and in the dark in their little back rooms because it’s harming us and when people find out about it, it’s like, wait *** minute, what you mean what? And it’s like well yeah that happened 10 years ago and they’re appalled that something like that could happen, but yet it does and no one’s exposing it, so. I get asked *** lot what are you gonna do to work with the legislature. I’m really not going to. They better figure out what they’re going to do to work for me because I’m fairly confident that California has had enough and they’re going to vote for me to fix California government for Californians, not for the Republicans, not for Democrats, independents for Californians that’s why California is broken because we only care about. 35, 38, 40% of the population and everybody else. Couldn’t care less. I’m doing this for Californians, not for political parties, political ideologies, it’s just California and that’s what people want, so when I get this office. If you are not going to. Admit that you were wrong, that your policies have created this, and we’re going to make changes, then I’m going to expose you to everybody that voted for me. And they’re going to not vote for you. I’ve, I’ve said it over and over that I think, I think we’re going to be able to work. I don’t think I’m going to have to target anybody and get them out in 2 years, but the worst case scenario is it’s only going to be hard for 2 years. Well, so on public safety though, just and especially the legislation that you’re referring to. Um, in terms of public safety and, and let’s acknowledge that I mean Californians do feel like some criminals are not held accountable right now. They feel like all 70% of us feel like no criminal is held accountable, but California is under *** court order that tried to. Especially in the early 2000s, direct the state to, I mean, well, was under *** court, they were right to on the, on the prison population. I, I, I don’t agree with the court. I mean, I, I would have wished that they wouldn’t have, but in their ruling and saying that it’s overcrowded and everything else, I’m like, yeah, you’re, you’re right. But then *** leader, *** true leader fixes it. And we didn’t get that. So let me put it to you, and this is the exact scenario. If you’re married, you’ve got 3 kids, and you live in *** 3 bedroom apartment, that means 2 of your kids are sharing *** room, and if you want rooms for all of your kids, you need to get *** bigger apartment, buy *** new house, do an add-on, something. You don’t get rid of one of your kids. So when the court said you’re too overcrowded. Instead of building more room so we’re not overcrowded, we got rid of all the kids, so the state should have built more prisons. Absolutely they should have. Absolutely they should have, because what they did, we went from 170,000 down to 90,000, 80,000, and it’s not because they didn’t commit crimes, it’s not because they didn’t. Crime is going up. It’s not because they didn’t finish their sentence, it’s because they let them all out of prison. They just let them go and the entire environment was all created on purpose. You let them all go, where are they going to go? They’re going to be homeless. They’ve got no place to go. Nobody wants them. Their family doesn’t want them anymore. Nobody wants to be associated with somebody that should have been in prison for *** long time and so they have no place to go. They have no job, so they end up homeless. So then you start giving homeless money, you start, then you make 2 years later you make drugs legal in California. So now you have all the homeless people all addicted to drugs and alcohol and everything else. Give them money so they stay there. You stop fighting the drug sales, the drug trafficking, and everything else. And so now all of those people are free to provide them all of that, and now you create *** homeless industrial complex that keeps that money flowing into that complex, and it never stops. And so now we’ve seen $25 billion disappear. We have no idea where it goes, and that’s just, that’s just the state. Los Angeles city alone, $2 billion *** year, and sometimes it’s even more than that. And just to be clear, you’re talking about, you’re talking about public tax dollars that have gone to homelessness. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So when you, so that the AB 109 created that. So all it did, it didn’t fix the problem, it made it worse everywhere else, so. Even Newsom, he claimed success because, oh look at my prison population, look at how great I am. All you did is let them all out. You let them all out into our communities or you forced them into county jails. So all of these state prison inmates that are now in county jail, now we’re all full. So now we all have to let. The lesser criminals out, so now there’s not even *** consequence. So any type of property, there are times throughout the year, I mean there’s there’s no rhyme or reason why, but it ends up that way because of my court orders and because of my federal lawsuit for bed space. There are times in my jail where we are deciding which person gets let out based on the extent of injuries to the victim because every single person in my jail. Has committed *** crime against another person. We don’t property crimes don’t go to jail. Drug crimes don’t go to jail. Nothing. *** misdemeanor domestic violence will go to *** jail because *** judge is ordering it. *** DUI sometimes will do *** couple of days in jail because *** judge is ordering it. Everything else gone. There’s no consequence. We’re enabling criminal activity here and that’s why crime is out of control in California and AB 109 was the start of it. When you fix problems. That’s the nature of *** problem solver and *** problem fixer is you fix the problem. You don’t you put *** band-aid on it. How are you going to fix it specifically? It’s going to have to be reversed. We’re going to have to make more room and now, I mean now we know that there’s plenty of room in prisons because he’s closing them. You can’t say we’re overcrowded if you’re closing them. You close 5 prisons. That means that means we have plenty of room in prison, so all 5 of them are getting reopened, and we’re going to put people that are going to victimize us in jail. There’s going to be *** consequence for crime. There has to be. We can’t have *** civilized society without an adherence to laws, and there has to be *** punishment for victimizing us. And in *** civilized society that punishment is jail. OK, I wanna move on to health care. Um, California right now, one of its biggest expenses is health care. Right now the state offers, um, medical, state health insurance to low income undocumented immigrants. Just your, I, I’ve, I’ve, um, you would not continue that program. And what would you do with the more than *** million undocumented people who don’t have, who would not have health insurance? And my guess is they’re only here because of that. We know from studies, we know from, we know from articles, we know from papers, uh, we know from talking to them that they’re only coming here for that. I mean they’re not, that’s it, they’re coming here for free. They’re coming here because it’s *** benefit to them. They’re coming here for free school, free money per month. They, I mean our state is lying to to all of us and saying that they don’t get welfare, they don’t get food stamps, they don’t get all those things. That’s *** lie. It’s *** flat out lie. And why, why do my kids not get it? California residents. No matter how poor they are, they’re not getting free school. They may get free food, they may get something, *** little bit of *** stimulus over here, but they’re not getting coddled to and brought here saying look how great it is and look how rich you can be. You can you can the assistance that we’re going to give you is like *** $50,000 *** year job. Why would you work? If you’re getting all that for free, why would you work? But on healthcare, I mean, if these, if undocumented people show up to the ER, I mean that cost is going to fall on either the county or the hospital. I mean, do you worry about that? I don’t know if I would say worry about that. I think that the entire medical system is being completely abused. We go back 50 years. Every doctor, I mean the Hippocratic Oath, nobody gets turned away. That’s what emergency rooms were for, was for emergencies. That’s not what emergency rooms are now. I’m in emergency rooms all the time. My deputies are in emergency rooms all the time and it’s filled with non-emergencies. It’s filled with people that are just going there because they have *** runny nose or their head hurts or they hurt their finger, you know, whatever the case may be, but we sit there and we watch it we know what we are living it we are living law enforcement, particularly some of the things that we’re involved with we are living through. The bad decisions and the bad policies that Sacramento is making and we just have to make it work. Nobody cares. They don’t care what we have to say. It’s almost just like just make it happen. That’s your job. Just go fix it, go make it right and sometimes we can’t, but we see where everything’s broken and nobody’s willing to fix it. That’s not what that’s not what emergency rooms were supposed to be for. They were supposed to be for emergency care and we turned them into, well, just show up and they’re gonna treat you and and. This is, this is *** huge long conversation because when you’re just talking about the medical industry, the medical industry is just as broken with the waste waste, fraud and abuse, and all you have to do is ask *** doctor. *** doctor will tell you that the entire medical system is completely broken. They have no control over it anymore and they should be the ones in control of it. The patient and the doctor should be in control of what’s happening, and it isn’t. It’s the pharmaceutical companies, it’s the insurance companies, everybody dictating how things are supposed to work, where’s the money going? How’s the money happening. So then where’s the governor’s role in all that? Putting people in place that are going to manage it how it’s supposed to be run and make sure that ethically, morally, legally that it’s all being run correctly and we don’t have that. We don’t have that. There is the people in place in our boards and commissions if they were doing things right, we wouldn’t be suffering from all these problems. If they were if they were trying to fix, if if the if the board in charge of electricity. Was trying to make California more affordable with electricity, we would be there, but instead that board makes record profits for the three big ones every single year. And how do they do it by raising our rates. Are you referring to the CPUC? Absolutely, absolutely. They will be replaced immediately because they have completely failed us. Why are our rates going up and we don’t, we can’t even, we, you don’t know if your power is gonna be on when you go home. The greatest, largest state in the country, and we don’t have *** power supply that can give us electricity. It it’s, it’s disgusting and it’s because of government, it’s because of the people on that board that are running that part. They are continuing to allow to the power companies. Increased profits without infrastructure without moving to *** power supply that actually provides us well, the utility companies might say, well, the state legislature and governor continue to add regulations onto us and therefore we’re coming to you, California Public Utilities Commission, for *** rate increase. Absolutely. I’m not blaming the power companies. I’m going to be best friends with the power companies. Oh, you will. I guarantee you. How so? Because I’m going to take away the regulations that are destroying their business, but then I’ll be, they’re not going to like me because I’m not going to allow them to buy off the board anymore. So you won’t be quite best friends. Yeah, it was, that was *** figure of speech. I mean, the re regulation is killing everything in California, no matter what industry. Sacramento legislators have destroyed every single industry in California with overregulation. What about AI? I mean there are *** lot of industries that are booming, especially in the tech sector in the state still. Are they? Are they booming how they should be, or are they just making money? Because every single one of them are leaving, every single one of them are looking for their opportunity to jump ship and go to *** different state. So just because somebody’s booming and just because they’re making *** living doesn’t mean they like it, doesn’t mean that they’re going to stay here. How many more companies have to leave? Don’t say, don’t say California’s booming when all of our big companies are leaving. There are, you look at, you look at the, this is another lie, but you look at the real numbers of people leaving California, the middle class, the middle upper class, even the middle lower class. Are all leaving California and they’re being replaced by illegals and then the numbers look kind of same we’re still losing they’re not all being replaced but really if you don’t if you take them out of the equation, the replacements with the illegals that are coming here. We’re losing massive hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people *** year. Some people say it’s *** million. The Newsom administration came out last week and said it’s 54,000 people left this this past year. Stop. I could probably name 54,000 people that left that we, we know that’s, it’s far more than 54,000. That’s the number that they say that that averages out. But here’s the whole thing. This is, this is the problem with California. This is how close we are to failure. There’s 140,000 people in California that pay 51% of the taxes. What happens when those 140,000 decide to leave? California is done, and those 140,000, you’re talking about the wealthiest people in the state, the 140,000 people that pay 51% of the taxes. Well, yes, of course they’re gonna be the wealthiest. But what happens when they decide to leave? And all of them, I guarantee you. All of them have thought about it. Let me ask you just what people really wanna know across every income demographic, how would you specifically lower costs for Californians? It’s, it’s going to be so easy it’s not even gonna be funny. I almost feel like. It It’s going to be so easy and so fast. The bar was set so low and we’ve been lied to for so long. It’s almost going to be people aren’t even going to believe it. It’s like how did gas get down that cheap already? How did houses get down that cheap already? How did my grocery bill go down so fast already? It’s all regulation and it’s regulation in specific areas for the cost of living. We can’t afford to live here anymore. So why wouldn’t *** supermajority with *** Democrat governor, why wouldn’t they do something to lower the cost of living? I mean that’s why is no one asking that? Why are they not doing something to lower the cost of gas? They don’t want gas lowered right now they’re all breathing *** sigh of relief because they can, they can blame the entire thing on President Trump. It’s the it it is, it is the most crazy thing I’ve ever seen. That We have had the highest priced gas for decades by $2 everybody knows it. And in the last 15 weeks all of *** sudden it’s only President Trump’s fault it’s nuts. So what am I going to do? All of the regulations that are destroying our building industry for homes, our gas industry with oil and refineries and all of that taxes we’re going to completely lower business taxes, people’s taxes, and then all of *** sudden you can. Afford to live here all of *** sudden you can you can afford to spend more money. All of *** sudden your business is making more money. You can hire more people. You can expand. You can open another business and you can stimulate stimulate the economy how it’s supposed to be stimulated, but you have to remove the regulations. All you have to do is ask somebody that left California, ask them why. If it was *** worker, they left because they couldn’t afford the taxes and the prices anymore. If it’s *** business, they left because of business tax and business regulation. So as *** problem solver. Instead of saying, so this is what the Democrat Party currently does, the current government right now, we know it’s Democrat. I, I get in trouble sometimes for saying you’re accurate it is, but it’s the current Democrat way out is oh my gosh, everybody’s leaving now we’re going to have to tax everybody else. Now we need *** mileage tax, not everyone, I mean the governor is against the billionaires’ tax. The leader of the state senate has said it’s not on the table. And um I mean not every Democrat agrees with and that’s that’s why I said I get in trouble because it’s but it’s that’s the direction we’re going there it’s always how can I get more revenue? How can I get more revenue? How can I get more revenue? No one is ever saying why can how can we stop them from leaving. It’s just they’re leaving. And we need more revenue. I want to say, why are you leaving? I’m going to fix that and we already know it’s regulation. Regulations can all be eliminated by the governor. I wanna switch gears to, I mean, voters in 2025 have sided with our state’s Democratic leaders when they put Proposition 50 on the ballot. I just, um, given the news, uh, earlier in the cycle with the ballots that your sheriff’s office seized in the situation, why exactly did you do that? Because it’s *** crime. What, what exactly was *** crime? Election fraud. What is, why would I, why would I look into *** murder? Because someone tells me there was *** murder, why would I look into, but did you believe the results of Prop 50? We’re not doing anything with Prop 50. We’re not. There’s not one single thing I’m doing to overthrow Prop 50. Your question was around the investigation was around the way Riverside County’s elections officials are handling that. No, no, this is, see, this is, this is one of the things. This is. This is where I get very frustrated with where we are in this investigation to begin with, because The Attorney General can lie every time he opens his mouth. He can put out things in print that are just flat out wrong and dishonest, and nobody cares, and then the media will report it. And then something will happen that it’s like, hey, that’s not true. Oh it’s too late now, we just keep moving on because the damage was already done. So when you say something and repeat it and the news says it, then people believe it, especially now it’s horrible with social media. This is probably one of the most basic, easy investigations you could ever believe in your entire life, and law enforcement investigates crime. And so when someone comes to us and says we believe there’s possible crime and election fraud is *** crime. It’s all out there. I didn’t make it up, but who is the suspect, if I can? We don’t know. We don’t know. I don’t know who’s the suspect in *** murder, and you don’t know until you investigate. You really don’t, and you really don’t even know if there was *** murder. I mean, *** murder is *** bad one. It could be *** fraud. So just to be clear, and I’m asking, I’ll tell you this is how easy this is. From our own records that our own ROV has daily records of ballots that were returned, there’s 611,000 ballots. That’s how many ballots they say came back into the ROV, but when you add up the yes and the no votes, it comes up to 658,000. So if you only have 611,000 ballots by your own count, how do you have 658,000 yes and no votes? So when we went and asked, there was no answer. He had no answer, dough in the headlights, couldn’t explain anything, so the explanation was human error. It’s like, well, human error of what and where? So *** basic investigation was. How many ballots were there then? If you’re saying that that’s wrong and you made human error and you missed by almost 10%, which is completely unacceptable, then we have to find out because if it wasn’t human error, then what was it? So from the very beginning, my first press conference when this happened, I said our intention is to count those ballots. What I want to happen. Is it was human error. They made *** massive mistake that hopefully they never make again, but the total number of ballots, I want them to match the total number of votes so I can tell Riverside County stop believing that there’s fraud going on. Is the over? No, because the attorney general won’t let it happen. But you’re still committed to investigating that, of course I am, but now we have to fight it in court because the attorney general is, is, is attempting to stop it. If you, if I tell you, I’m, I’m not gonna call you out, I’ll say when I talk to other people when they ask me the same question and I say if I, I have 611,000 ballots but I have this many votes. Don’t you think I should count the ballots to see if, if it matches, and they’re like, well, yes, of course, why wouldn’t you? But if the the attorney general doesn’t want to, who cares whether they’re certified or not? How were they certified if there’s 611,0658? How did they get certified? So all we have to do is make sure, because here’s the, here’s the, my, what my goal would be, I want it to just end. I want it to be, look, they’re equal, they match, so let’s move on. But what if they don’t? What if there’s only 611,000 ballots? How did the machine count 658,000 votes? There’s there’s something massively, massively wrong there. And then in an investigator’s world, which is 33 years of my life, in an investigator’s world when you ask legitimate questions and you’re trying to get to the truth and you’re getting *** whole bunch of things that don’t make sense at all, you have to ask yourself why. Why wouldn’t the attorney general just want to count those ballots and prove to everybody, look, this is what he could do. We already know what he feels about me and it’s all political. Why wouldn’t he, why wouldn’t he count those ballots to say that they’re right and then say, look, look what the sheriff is trying to do over here, but we proved he was wrong. Why he’s not even trying to do that. He’s trying to keep it from happening so he can get those ballots back after May 2nd, which is already over now. So now when he gets those ballots back, they’re going to immediately destroy him. OK, I have three final quick, maybe easier. Questions. OK, OK well, we, we talked *** lot about Democrats here, but I mean given the electorate, what is your message to Democrats who realize you’re not part of their political party, but how will you represent them? I’m part of California with them. I don’t want to be part of their political party. I don’t want them to be part of mine. I want us all to be Californians. And we are, we are not broken because we’re Californians, we’re broken because we’re *** political party we are political identity identity politics is destroying not only the country but particularly California and I don’t want them to vote for me because. I’m *** Republican And I certainly don’t want them to not vote for me just because I’m *** Republican. I’m running this race for Californians. It’s, I’m not, I even say I win. First Republican, I, you will, I would, I will be the last person that you ever see jumping up and down saying *** Republican won. We turn the state red. I, I don’t want any part of that. What I’m going to do is I’m going to win for Californians, which kind of indicates that the, the natural political pendulum is on its way back down. And if I’m going to be *** successful governor, I have to stop it in the middle. I have to stop the pendulum from spinning back the other way. Speaking of the pendulum, what grade would you give Governor Gavin Newsom *** through F? F. There is not one single thing that he has done for California, not one. And if there was something, I’ve, I’ve said this in forums with all the Democrats, I’ve said it in the debates, point to me one thing. Just point to me where he’s *** success. What has he done for us? I did it in *** group of Democrats that that are running for that are running for this office, and I threw it out there and said. I’ll leave as soon as you show me where your policies and your agenda have been *** success, and the only thing they could come up with was free school lunch. OK, what are 3 words that you would use to describe California under Governor Chad Bianco? The absolute best. All right, Sheriff Bianco, thank you so much for your time. You’re welcome.
Chad Bianco explains why he should be California’s next governor | California Politics 360
Updated: 8:25 AM PDT May 10, 2026
Chad Bianco sat down for an interview with California Politics 360 for a wide-ranging conversation on his run to be the state’s next governor.The Riverside County Sheriff is running as a Republican in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom, who terms out at the end of 2026. Bianco is promising to make significant changes to state spending, regulations, and priorities. “Somebody has to do it to make a drastic change, the last thing California needs is the status quo,” Bianco said. Bianco expressed concern about affordability in the state, saying, “I came to California looking for the best life possible and I do believe I truly achieved it, and I unfortunately now have kids looking elsewhere for theirs because they can’t afford to buy a house, they can’t afford gas, they can’t afford groceries.” He criticized the state’s spending practices, stating, “We have hundreds of billions of dollars in budget. We don’t have a money problem. California has never had a money problem, we have a massive spending problem.” When asked about cutting programs, Bianco said, “I don’t know if I would say cutting programs. I would say, I think we can all possibly agree from the last two months a quarter of our budget is fraud, I guarantee it. That we could find $50 billion a year on fraud.” He added that fraud exists across “every single department,” including areas like homelessness, medical services, and the DMV. Bianco emphasized the need to reprioritize government spending, saying, “First we have to go back to government’s responsibility anyway and priorities are where you spend your money and California’s priorities are completely upside down.” He said public safety should be the top priority, stating, “No matter what, the number one role of any government federal or not, is public safety. The federal government keeps us safe from foreign invaders, local government keeps us safe from criminals. Police and fire is the number one responsibility in government.” When asked about education and healthcare, Bianco said, “Education is my number three. I would change the state law.” He expressed a willingness to revisit how much of the state budget is allocated to education, saying, “Absolutely, because there’s no way it should be 40%.” When asked how much it should be, he replied, “A whole lot less than that.” Bianco also promised to reverse several criminal justice laws, including one that shifted responsibility for lower-level criminals from the state prison system to local law enforcement. He said he would cut regulations related to the environment, housing, farming, and other areas he believes are hindering businesses and driving up costs. On healthcare, Bianco said he would end state health insurance for undocumented immigrants. Acknowledging the challenge of working with a legislature dominated by Democrats, Bianco said, “I get asked a lot, what are you doing to do to work with the legislature? I’m really not going to. They better figure out what they’re going to do to work for me, because I’m fairly confident that California has had enough.” Bianco also addressed his investigation into election fraud in Riverside County, which involved the seizure of hundreds of thousands of ballots earlier this year. He said, “This is probably one of the most basic and easy investigations and law enforcement investigates crime and so when someone comes to us it’s a crime. Election fraud is a crime.” He explained discrepancies in ballot counts, saying, “Daily records of ballots that were returned, there’s 611,000 ballots. That’s how many they say came back into the ROV but when you add up Yes and No votes it adds up to 658,000. How? When we went and asked there was no answer. He had no answer.” Bianco confirmed his commitment to continuing the investigation, saying, “Of course I am, but now we have to fight it in court.” When asked how he would represent Californians who are not part of his political party, Bianco said, “I’m part of California with them. I don’t want to be part of their political party or they with mine. I want us all to be Californians.” Finally, when asked to describe California under his leadership in three words, Bianco said, “The absolute best.”See more interviews with California governor candidates here.KCRA 3 Political Director Ashley Zavala reports in-depth coverage of top California politics and policy issues. She is also the host of “California Politics 360.” Get informed each Sunday at 8:30 a.m. on KCRA 3.
Chad Bianco sat down for an interview with California Politics 360 for a wide-ranging conversation on his run to be the state’s next governor.
The Riverside County Sheriff is running as a Republican in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom, who terms out at the end of 2026.
Bianco is promising to make significant changes to state spending, regulations, and priorities.
“Somebody has to do it to make a drastic change, the last thing California needs is the status quo,” Bianco said.
Bianco expressed concern about affordability in the state, saying, “I came to California looking for the best life possible and I do believe I truly achieved it, and I unfortunately now have kids looking elsewhere for theirs because they can’t afford to buy a house, they can’t afford gas, they can’t afford groceries.”
He criticized the state’s spending practices, stating, “We have hundreds of billions of dollars in budget. We don’t have a money problem. California has never had a money problem, we have a massive spending problem.”
When asked about cutting programs, Bianco said, “I don’t know if I would say cutting programs. I would say, I think we can all possibly agree from the last two months a quarter of our budget is fraud, I guarantee it. That we could find $50 billion a year on fraud.” He added that fraud exists across “every single department,” including areas like homelessness, medical services, and the DMV.
Bianco emphasized the need to reprioritize government spending, saying, “First we have to go back to government’s responsibility anyway and priorities are where you spend your money and California’s priorities are completely upside down.”
He said public safety should be the top priority, stating, “No matter what, the number one role of any government federal or not, is public safety. The federal government keeps us safe from foreign invaders, local government keeps us safe from criminals. Police and fire is the number one responsibility in government.”
When asked about education and healthcare, Bianco said, “Education is my number three. I would change the state law.” He expressed a willingness to revisit how much of the state budget is allocated to education, saying, “Absolutely, because there’s no way it should be 40%.” When asked how much it should be, he replied, “A whole lot less than that.”
Bianco also promised to reverse several criminal justice laws, including one that shifted responsibility for lower-level criminals from the state prison system to local law enforcement. He said he would cut regulations related to the environment, housing, farming, and other areas he believes are hindering businesses and driving up costs. On healthcare, Bianco said he would end state health insurance for undocumented immigrants.
Acknowledging the challenge of working with a legislature dominated by Democrats, Bianco said, “I get asked a lot, what are you doing to do to work with the legislature? I’m really not going to. They better figure out what they’re going to do to work for me, because I’m fairly confident that California has had enough.”
Bianco also addressed his investigation into election fraud in Riverside County, which involved the seizure of hundreds of thousands of ballots earlier this year. He said, “This is probably one of the most basic and easy investigations and law enforcement investigates crime and so when someone comes to us it’s a crime. Election fraud is a crime.”
He explained discrepancies in ballot counts, saying, “Daily records of ballots that were returned, there’s 611,000 ballots. That’s how many they say came back into the ROV but when you add up Yes and No votes it adds up to 658,000. How? When we went and asked there was no answer. He had no answer.” Bianco confirmed his commitment to continuing the investigation, saying, “Of course I am, but now we have to fight it in court.”
When asked how he would represent Californians who are not part of his political party, Bianco said, “I’m part of California with them. I don’t want to be part of their political party or they with mine. I want us all to be Californians.”
Finally, when asked to describe California under his leadership in three words, Bianco said, “The absolute best.”
KCRA 3 Political Director Ashley Zavala reports in-depth coverage of top California politics and policy issues. She is also the host of “California Politics 360.” Get informed each Sunday at 8:30 a.m. on KCRA 3.