Ringside: Chad Bianco Could Hand the U.S. Congress to Democrats
Good job, Chad Bianco – This is the choice you made
By Edward Ring, June 1, 2026 1:20 pm
As we ponder the results of the election in progress, wondering which races will have known outcomes by the end of the evening and which shall end up so close that it will take a month before we have final results, it’s timely to reflect on just how much potential harm Chad Bianco has willfully inflicted not just on California, but the entire nation.
For a while, Bianco’s choice to stay in the race was understandable. Maybe he’d outperform Steve Hilton in the gubernatorial debates, maybe Hilton would lose momentum, and maybe, just maybe, his polling percentages would catch up with Hilton. After all, at the beginning of 2026 there were still eight serious democrat candidates in the race for governor, inspiring more than a few credulous Republicans into fantasizing about Hilton and Bianco pulling a one-two in the primary.
All of this became impossible by the first week of May. The three major polls taken that week had Hilton’s lead over Bianco had grown to 23-13 (Binder), 22-13 (Kreate), and 20-14 (Mellman). In the second week of May, Hilton extended his lead over Bianco in three more polls to 20-13 (PPIC), 22-11 (Evitarus), and 17-11 (Emerson). Now, going into election week, the Real Clear Politics average of seven major polls conducted since 5/24 puts Hilton ahead of Bianco 23.3-10.9.
If California’s voters hadn’t been conned into approving Proposition 14 in 2010, which threw away ballots where the winning candidate from every qualifying political party would get a chance in the general election, then Bianco could claim he’s staying in the race on principle. But for the last 16 years, candidates compete in so-called jungle primaries, where the top two finishers advance to the November ballot regardless of party.
So when Chad Bianco was weighing what principles inform his political choices, he had to consider the rise of Xavier Becerra, who was the Democratic party’s inevitable answer to the fragmented field. Becerra, a lifetime politician who can be relied upon to do whatever the special interests who run California tell him to do, has been propelled from obscurity less than two months ago to now being the front-runner, polling at 24.6 percent.
Meanwhile, Democrat Tom Steyer is proving that if you hire the right people, you just might buy your way into the governor’s office. Steyer, who is running one of the most cynical campaigns this state has ever seen, is a billionaire oligarch posing as a leftist fanatic. To sell this preposterous paradox, accompanied by promises on the issues of housing, health care, and energy that can’t possibly be fulfilled, he has hired one of the finest claques of political operatives in America. Against the odds, the team Steyer hired was previously responsible for the victories of Zohran Mamdani, John Fetterman, and Ruben Gallego. Steyer’s got a crack team running his campaign and he’s willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to saturate the air with their work. He now sits at 21 percent in the polls.
This is the reality Chad Bianco knows as well as anyone. On primary election day in California, there is a three way race for two spots on the November ballot, and it’s too close to call. Chad Bianco saw this coming long enough ago to have dropped out to ensure Hilton would make it onto the November ballot, and he chose instead to stay in the race.
There is far more at stake here than just who becomes the next governor of California. If two Democrats are on the November ballot, how many Republicans will be so disgusted they will not even bother to vote? And what are the consequences of low GOP turnout?
To begin with, there are critical ballot initiatives. The Local Taxpayer Protection Act will save Proposition 13 by closing loopholes that have allowed local governments and interest groups to bypass Prop. 13’s voter protections and raise taxes. It must pass.
And then there is the retaliatory initiative ACA 13 which will require any citizen-initiated constitutional amendments that propose a higher vote threshold for state or local ballot measures to meet the same higher threshold to pass. It must fail.
Let’s not forget the “One-Time” Wealth Tax initiative, where in the fine print it empowers the state legislature, any time it chooses, to gut Prop. 13, make the wealth tax permanent instead of “one-time,” and lower the threshold from “billionaires” to whatever level of personal net worth they wish. This initiative must fail.
A low GOP turnout also harms GOP chances in every close race, and there are several. According to Cal Matters, there are four races for State Senate and seven races for State Assembly that are competitive. It is not feasible this year to shift control of the state legislature to Republicans. But eliminating their two-thirds majority is worth fighting for. The GOP can make progress this year toward that goal, but not if voters stay home.
Where Chad Bianco’s refusal to bow out of the race is going to consign him to historic infamy, however, it’s when it comes to control of the U.S. Congress. There are eight competitive U.S. House races in California for the November 2026 general election, and it doesn’t take a political pro to understand how much is at stake.
As it is, Republicans only hold 7 out of 52 seats in California’s congressional delegation. Democrats are favored to pick up 2 to 4 of these 7, shrinking Republican held seats down to between 3 and 5. The timing couldn’t be worse. Control of the U.S. Congress hangs by a thread. It is quite possible that Democrats could win control of the U.S. Congress by a single seat margin, and if so, every close congressional race that is lost in California will be the reason for this much bigger setback.
These realities and their consequences were known to Chad Bianco. If Republican voters stay home this November because Chad Bianco split the Republican party and handed our gubernatorial options to a pair of Democrats, close races will swing to the Democrats. That includes a chance to protect Prop. 13, prevent the state legislature from raising taxes, reduce the 2/3 majority in the state legislature, and, most consequential of all, maintain control of the U.S. Congress.
Good job, Chad Bianco. This is the choice you made.
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January 4, 2019 -
Sorry, not sorry, Mr. Ring….
Given the level of corruption and MISmanagement evident in California governance over the last 12-18 months (and more, going back to Julie Su failing upwards to the national stage under “Joe Biden”) many of us believe that Steve Hilton is Schwarzenegger 2.0, a big talker who will fold like a lawn chair in the face of the swamp denizens of Sacramento, both elected and unelected lobbyists.
While their platforms appear similar, we do not believe that Hilton has the brass and conviction to prosecute the bad guys amd girls who are ripping off the taxpayers along with the CARB/CEQA cabals.
Polls be dawned-they are a statistically insignificant sample size and the entire political system since Clinton has been corrupted and the pollsters have their own funding skeletons.
No one in my wide network has ever been contacted by a pollster, so we ignore them.
Remember how the polls said Hillary was a lock for President in 2016? We do… ignored as a result.
We voted our convictions and instincts and strongly believe that Chad Bianco is the strongest candidate to actually turn California around.
Plus, I was in the Hilton camp early on, but something never felt right and when the campaign sent out two mudslinging texts, I did my own research and realized that he was lying and spinning the BLM situation to besmirch Bianco.
If he lies on the campaign trail, he’s a liar and California already has too many lying politicians in office.
There are other aspects of Hilton’s actions and background that didn’t quite fit the dire needs of the state, so we voted our conscience for Bianco and pray that he prevails in spite of articles like this one and the California Post.
Time will tell…
Besides, the Democrats and their “break glass” option provided by Dominion’s backdoor exploits and “adjudication” feature means that all California elections are suspect due to the widespread cheating and lax procedural controls associated by cheat-by-mail balloting and processing in secret… 2020 was evidence of that….
We will see…..
And if there are two Democrats on the ballot for governor in November, are you still going to vote? Will you still cast a ballot to support the initiatives we need to pass, and defeat the ones we need to fail?
Horrible article. Why did Hilton jump in the race after Bianco was already running? He could have supported Bianco. You’re pushing the same narrative that the establishment media is pushing. Everyone I know is voting for Bianco, not Hilton.
By your logic, the first to announce candidacy is the presumed and entitled candidate.
I like Bianco, I just wish he made the decision to remain in riverside county being a hard nosed sheriff. If Hilton wins, I think he will be all alone being shredded from every leftist bastion of viscious bs, and the best he’ll be able to do is to be a semi effective stopper, and the same for Bianco with the difference being Bianco knows how to carry on investigations
I Voted for Bianco. All the others just seemed slimy.
“to prosecute the bad guys amd girls…”
Neither a governor nor a sheriff prosecutes anyone, that’s left to a PROSECUTOR. A SHERIFF investigates, arrests, and refers suspects to a PROSECUTOR while managing the jaild. JUDGES manage trials and issue legal rulings. JURIES decide guilt or innocence. The accused has the right to representation, to mount a defense against accusation. Anyone remember DA George Gascon? How about judge Boasberg or juries in minneapolis? The best a republican governor can do is attempt to dismantle a corrupt system, and until californians get it good and hard enough from the communists in Sacramento there might not be much a Republican governor will be able to do. Think about how Trump was waylaid by the bureaucracy and hunted by members of congress in his first term, then how he came back and kicked ass for his second term. The attacks and sabotage are going to be worse in Sacramento, and not everyone has Trump’s moxie. Politics is a nasty business.
Both sides of a very unjust coin: Former LA county district attorney George Gascon and former Riverdide county district attorney Rod Pacheco. Gascon let criminals loose, Pacheco chased everyone else, he would file charges if a leaf blew in the window and landed on his desk – Pacheco sought a high conviction rate instead of justice. The riverside county court system is still jacked up from Pacheco somehow suborning it to his will.
Some of us are disappointed that Chad Bianco gestured submission and took a knee when his words of de-escalation weren’t enough during the violent Democrat BLM riots.
It doesn’t matter. The ONLY chance for a GOP candidate to become governor is if somehow both of the potential candidates in November were GOP. If one of them was a Dem, then they would win by default regardless. So, our only chance here was to get both Hilton and Bianco on the ballot in November. Honestly, I mostly blame Trump for messing this up. He should never have endorsed Hilton before the primary. As soon as he did that, support for Bianco collapsed, and this, coupled with the Dems taking out the low hanging fruit that was Fartwell, is why Becerra shot up in the polls. He is the Dem machine’s chosen candidate and sadly, will most likely be our next governor and nothing in this state will improve. Even if Steyer makes it on the November ballot with Becerra, he will not win because he doesn’t have the backing of the Dem machine. And in this state, what the Dem machine wants, the Dem machine gets. I will give Ed Ring credit in that many of us are starting to wonder more and more “what’s the point of voting?” when 60% of the voters in this state are so blind to, or just don’t care about, the destruction wrought by those in state office that we will never be able to vote our way out of the mess we are currently in anyway.
I’m puzzled why Bianco did the BLM knee thing, I believe he prevented antifa from burning down Riverside county and I say all the following with the dubious honor of spending a couple of overnighters in one of his facilities. I also had a number of personal conversations with Bianco. I like the way he runs his department and there would be more genuine criminals in his jails if not for sacramento hamstringing law enforcement. From another angle: some years ago I believe he had a terrier like tunnel vision on meth addicts, copper thieves, gang bangers, murderers and the like. I don’t know where he’s at now concerning the then newly passed laws mandating the grooming of children in schools, he angrily denied the concept that what would have formerly sent an “educator” to jail for a long time is now perfectly legal and even mandated. Some 40 years ago I thought cops were always right and could do no wrong, then I had some unjust experiences decades ago where I came to hate cops and the courts for a long time (long before I met Bianco). Bianco was originally quietly skeptical of my story and maybe he is still, but he actually listened to me instead of blowing me off and walking away. On balance I think Bianco would be a lot better off continuing his work as sheriff than walking into the sacramento slaughterhouse and finding himself on the butcher’s table.
For the two overnighters in Bianco’s jails: One was during pacheco’s reign which was probably before Bianco’s term as sheriff. Pacheco filed on me on an allegation of public intoxication for which there was no evidence and was angling for a plea bargain that would have destroyed my making living for a year by the terms. My attorney thought they were going to force us into the work and cost of preparing for trial then drop it at the first court appearance, my atty convinced the prosecutor to let it go. In the meantime the cops who arrested me meant to hurt mand they did. The other had to do with allegation of DUI where I legaly refused the roadside blow and sobriety tests (witnessing against oneself) and tested .06 with a blood test. Waiting for results was the reason for the overnight stay. The reason for doing the blood test rather than the headquarters blow test is during the 90s a pissed off san bernardino county cop and a jailhouse cop buddy tried to frame me on DUI with false documentation and manufacturing a false reciept out of the blow machine. Doing a blood test takes the results out of the officer’s hands. The san bernardino cop was an asshole as well as the riverside county COs during Pacheco’s time. During the last encounter the highway patrolman (who stopped me for speeding and smelled alcohol) treated me very well and so did the COs in Bianco’s jailhouse. The case was not forwarded to DA Hestrin do to lack of evidence, but it took several months for the CHP watch commander to advise me of that fact. For both DUI allegations the DMV review board swiftly cut me loose. There may be cops who are saints, but while there may be some I like I don’t trust a single one of them.