Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco is running for California governor, touting his decades of law enforcement experience in “protecting the community and ensuring the safety of all its residents.”
A new report, however, takes aim at his claims, identifying him as “the sheriff with California’s worst crime-solving record.”
A report from the San Francisco-based Center on Juvenile & Criminal Justice pointed out that the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department solved only 9.2% of violent and property crimes between 2019 and 2024, the only county in the state that failed to reach double digits.
Using data from the California Department of Justice, the CJCJ questioned Bianco’s fitness for the governorship.
“It is hard to take seriously Bianco’s promises to improve public safety or his complaints that California’s streets are less safe, government is failing, drug abuse is more rampant, and crimes occur ’without consequences’ when these ills are nowhere more true than in his own bailiwick,” the report said.
Bianco, however, pushed back against what he called a “political hit piece from a disingenuous source and contributors.”
He claims the state data is “fatally flawed,” as officials were “intentionally trying to obtain data in a way that would paint a negative picture.”
“The Riverside County Sheriff’s Office is one of the most efficient, and successful agencies in the country at protecting our communities, and Riverside County residents know it,” Bianco told the Press-Enterprise.