Chad Bianco, the pro-Trump sheriff of Riverside County, California, was ordered by the California Supreme Court to stop a voter fraud investigation, according to reports on Wednesday.
A court order issued on Wednesday stated that Bianco's office must immediately "halt its investigation and preserve all seized election materials pending further review in court," The Desert Sun reported.
Bianco is a Republican California gubernatorial candidate and was in a high-profile clash with California state officials after he seized 650,000 ballots from the Proposition 50 referendum, which established a new mid-decade congressional map to draw five Republicans in retaliation for GOP efforts to do the same to Democrats in Texas. Even some Republican leaders in the Golden State have condemned his actions.
But Bianco's seizure of ballots, evidently to try to investigate baseless allegations of fraud, was part of a broader pattern of his extreme anti-voting and conspiracy theorist beliefs, according to reports.