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VISIT HEYSOCAL.COM
MONDAY, MAY 18-MAY 24, 2026
NO. 276
VOL. 12,
Internal emails show how fringe groups fueled Sheriff Chad Bianco’s ballot seizure By Anat Rubin and Jessica Pishko, CalMatters
I
n the spring of 2022, a woman named Shelby Bunch began appearing at government hearings in Riverside County, demanding that officials there address what she believed was an epidemic of fraud in local elections. Bunch often introduced herself as a representative of New California, a secessionist movement that seeks to break away from what it describes as the tyranny of a Democraticcontrolled state. She accused Riverside officials of colluding in criminal activity and warned that they would soon “be answering to law enforcement.” She once closed her comments by telling the Riverside County Board of Supervisors to “have a crappy day.” The supervisors didn’t seem to take Bunch seriously, but she found a powerful ally in Riverside Sheriff Chad Bianco. Based on her various claims, including that the county’s electronic voting
machines had been remotely manipulated, the sheriff put one of his senior investigators in charge of a criminal probe into the registrar of voters. The investigator, Christopher Poznanski, quickly came to the conclusion that there was no evidence of a crime. On July 20, 2022, he sent Bunch an email letting her know he was closing the case. “I understand this may not be the desired outcome,” he wrote. “But know that I did not take this case lightly and considered all of the information.” Bunch was furious. She demanded that Poznanski investigate the “corrupt machines.” But Poznanski was unmoved. “I respect your passion for this cause, but I will conduct no further investigation into the matter,” he wrote. Bunch continued to write Bianco directly, urging him to reopen the case. Then, in early September, she got some help. A figure in the “consti-
Sheriff Chad Bianco speaks to reporters March 20 about his election probe. | Photo courtesy of Riverside County Sheriff/YouTube
tutional sheriff” movement, which asserts that elected sheriffs are more powerful than anyone — including the president and the courts — sent Bianco an email.
“I just heard this past week that a group of your constituents requested that you investigate election fraud in Riverside County and that your investigator was
unable to find anything and you closed your investigation,” Steve Tuminello wrote to Bianco. “I know that as a Constitutional Sheriff you realize how extremely important Election Integrity is, and that you would welcome any assistance in these investigations.” Bianco, whose career has been guided by the movement, wrote back to say he had launched another, more ambitious investigation. Emails obtained by CalMatters trace the development of a years-long case that ultimately led to Bianco’s unprecedented seizure of 650,000 ballots in March. They reveal that his sprawling investigation was based on the thinnest of evidence and raise alarms over how the November elections could be disrupted by the unproven claims of fringe groups and ideologically aligned officials. That scenario is particu-
larly troubling in Riverside County, which is home to one of a few dozen congressional districts in the country that could determine control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the midterm elections. Bianco’s emails with Bunch also show that he doubted some of her group’s allegations. In one exchange in 2023, Bunch suggested the county supervisors were complicit in election fraud and might have ties to drug cartels. “This is absolutely ridiculous,” Bianco responded. “Just because ‘someone’ convinced themselves of something doesn’t mean its reality.” Bianco told Bunch her group was “acting stupid.” “I actually cant believe I took the time to respond,” he wrote. Still, he pushed the investigation forward. In a 2024 podcast interview, Bunch said the sheriff
See Bianco elections Page 24
He was fired for sexually harassing students. California allowed him to keep teaching anyway. By Holly McDede, KQED, and Mollie Simon, ProPublica This story was originally published by ProPublica. This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with KQED. Sign up for Dispatches to get stories like this one as soon as they are published.
J
ason Agan was impossible to miss at Angelo Rodriguez High School. The San Francisco Bay Area teacher was loud and gregarious, a fixture on campus since the Fairfield school opened in 2001. He ran the student government and called himself the man behind the curtain, organiz-
ing pep rallies and prom. He taught AP calculus, so advanced math students ended up in his classroom, jostling for his approval and letters of recommendation. Some considered him a mentor who inspired a love of math — and even a second father. But for years students
also whispered about Agan’s behavior, according to interviews with 14 Rodriguez High graduates, most of whom he had taught. He touched some of them in public in ways that made them uncomfortable, they said, including hugging students and massaging their shoulders. And he
seemed fixated on enforcing the dress code, calling out girls whose shorts were too short. Nearly two decades into Agan’s tenure, and on the heels of the #MeToo movement, students had enough. At least 11 students and one parent submitted written complaints about his
behavior to school administrators in 2018, drawing at least two warnings to stop, a KQED and ProPublica investigation found. By January 2019, the Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District had taken steps to fire him,
suspending him without pay. Agan pushed back, and nearly a year later an independent panel convened by the state to hear his case deemed him “unfit to teach.” The panel’s decision meant
See Sexual harassment Page 03