NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
A lifelong New York Yankees fan is asking the people of California to make him their next governor.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who grew up in the heyday of the 1970-80s Yankees-Dodgers rivalry, admitted he had mixed emotions when Shohei Ohtani and company beat his childhood team in the 2024 World Series.
“I did [celebrate]. I was sad because I wanted the Yankees to win, but at the time, as a baseball fan I also noticed the Dodgers were a better team. The Dodgers deserved to win and I was very happy to be from the Los Angeles area,” Bianco told Fox News Digital.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Around that same time, Bianco watched one of his Republican colleagues, and a staple in the 70s-80s Dodgers-Yankees rivalry, former Dodgers star Steve Garvey, make a run at a U.S. Senate seat in California. Bianco campaigned with Garvey. But Garvey came up well short against Democrat incumbent Adam Schiff that year.
Now, Bianco, who is currently a frontrunner for the California governorship in many 2026 polls, believes that two years of Democratic leadership since Garvey’s failed run has only strengthened the case for voting Republican in the Golden State.
“We’re in a little bit worse off scenario than we were in 2024,” Bianco said. “Californians are realizing that politics are corrupt, our state government is corrupt, and crime is really out of control.”
And sports hasn’t been spared any concerns in the state.
With the Winter Olympics now over, and the Summer Olympics coming to Los Angeles just over two years from now, anxiety has mounted over the feasibility of the city being able to host the games, due to crime rates, homelessness, damage from the 2025 wildfires, and rising taxes.
And on the youth front, the state faces an ongoing wave of biological male transgender athletes competing in girls’ high school sports, as California leadership has refused to comply with President Donald Trump’s mandate to ensure only female athletes compete in girls’ sports. The state’s refusal has prompted a Department of Justice lawsuit, multiple federal investigations, as dozens of California girls facing life-changing trauma, with some filing la”wsuits of their own.
Bianco thinks he has solutions for both issues.
The 2028 LA Olympics
As a sheriff, Bianco believes that if Los Angles was set to hold the Olympics this summer, in the city’s current state, it would not be possible to do so.
“No, I don’t think so,” Bianco said of the city being able to host the games if they occurred this year.
“Everyone’s wondering how they’re going to arrange the Olympics… we don’t have the money to dedicate to this, we don’t have the updated resources to dedicate to this, for transportation or even housing… I think it is absolutely embarrassing… I think the U.S. is going to have an amazing Olympics, but for the city of Los Angeles it’s certainly not a proud moment.”
Bianco pointed to financial mismanagement and alleged fraud in the state government.
Los Angeles continues to experience one of the nation’s largest homeless populations, with approximately 72,000+ individuals, driven by severe shortages in affordable housing and high rent, per the LA Homeless Services Authority.
Bianco warned of what he expects Democrat leadership would do if they remain in power when the Olympics comes around.
“They will go in at the last minute, and they will forcibly remove all of them and it’s not like they remove them, they just force them to the outskirts away from the perimeters of where these events are going to be,” Bianco said. “It’s not good for anyone, it’s not good for those events, it’s not good for those neighborhoods, it’s certainly not good for the people who are homeless.”
Bianco said a more feasible solution would require possibly years of resource re-allocation, which he hopes to take on as the state’s next governor. He would eliminated funding to
“We will have a year, possibly a year and a half to two years, to make sure we address the homeless situation, and I guarantee you that’s enough time,” Bianco said.
“It really isn’t homeless, it’s not homes, it’s drug and alcohol addiction, combined with mental health issues. And we have to be honest and we have to start addressing it for what it is. So you eliminate all the money going to the non-profits and NGOs that’s being wasted, abused and funneled back into politics. You stop that immediately.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a republican candidate for California governor, stops to speak with a woman during a tour of Skid Row in Los Angeles on Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2026. (Sarah Reingewirtz/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images)
“You put a small portion of that into the drug and alcohol rehab and the mental health rehab, and the centers that treat both. Because right now those don’t exist. I can almost guarantee you that we can address 90% of the homeless issue that we see on the streets within the first year. Within the second year, we can have it all gone.”
There is also an issue of financial strain on athletes coming into the state.
Bianco pointed to the recent Super Bowl in Santa Clara, and the financial burden that hit the players who competed in it simply because they had to pay California taxes.
Seattle Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold lost approximately $71,000 due to California’s strict “jock tax”. While earning a $178,000 winner’s bonus, the week spent in California for Super Bowl LX triggered high state taxes on his, amounting to roughly $249,000, as the tax applies to prorated earnings from his three-year, $105 million contract.
For the Olympic athletes coming to the city in 2028, especially Americans, many of whom make far less than the average NFL player, Bianco worries how the state’s current tax system could put them at a disadvantage due to financial constraints.
“It’s going to seriously affect them with the cost of living here,” Bianco said. “They don’t make a lot of money… it’s astronomically more expensive than any place across the country, so it’s going to be detrimental for those people.”
Bianco has proposed eliminating the state income tax, intending to replace lost revenue with income from oil production. He has also stated that as governor, he would eliminate the gas tax and oppose a “mileage tax.”
“Taxes are hurting everyone,” Bianco said.
Trans athletes in girls’ sports
California has been the nation’s biggest hot bed for high school and college scandals involving biological male trans athletes competing in girls’ and women’s sports.
Current California Gov. Gavin Newsom has said he believes males in female sports is “deeply unfair” but hasn’t taken any steps to address. Newsom’s office provided a statement to Fox News Digital in September, suggesting the issue is beyond his control and responsibility.
“For the law to change, the legislature would need to send the Governor a bill. They have not,” part of the statement read.
Bianco said Newsom’s office is not telling the truth.
“Every time he opens his mouth he’s not telling the truth. He’s telling his version of what he wants you to believe… The reality is the governor is the top executive officer in this entire state and he sets the rules” Bianco said.
“That’s the governor lying to push the blame onto somebody else because he doesn’t want to be held responsible for what’s happening in our schools and our girls, because he wants to be president, and he knows the majority of the country is never ever ever going to vote for him knowing that he won’t stop this, so he’s blaming someone else.”
Bianco said he would use “force” as governor to ensure that girls’ sports are protected.
“You force people to not,” he said of how to handle schools letting males in girls’ sports. “In our high schools and in our school system, if they are going to allow it, we will not fund that. We will not fund the school, we will not provide them with their money.”
But preventing the issue from persisting is only half the battle. The fact is, the issue has persisted in California now for several years, and the state and many residents are dealing with the aftermath.
Young male children in California have even been transitioned at schools, without their parents’ permission, and later placed on girls’ sports teams and in thier locker rooms.
UFC LEGEND ENDORSES PRO-LAW ENFORCEMENT PICK FOR CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR: ‘WE NEED HIS STRENGTH’
Now, the state faces a lawsuit from the DOJ over its policy, while many schools face individualized lawsuits for related incidents.
Bianco believes he could “easily” settle the DOJ lawsuit simply by complying with Trump’s mandate.
But the individual incidents may require more steps, according to Bianco.
In Bianco’s home county of Riverside, two separate lawsuits have been filed against school districts.
A major state-funded university, San Jose State University, has been found by the U.S. Department of Education to have violated Title IX in its handling of a transgender volleyball player from 2022-24, and faces a lawsuit from former athletes and a former coach over the same issue.
Bianco believes the young women who have been affected by it are deserving of financial compensation, compensation from the schools and compensation directly from the state.
“Some [girls] have been seriously injured, and some were just emotionally traumatized. The schools should be paying for that. The state government should be paying for that,” Bianco said. “Our civil process allows for monetary remedies for situations like this, and they should be getting tons of money, because they have seriously been victimized.
“There certainly has to be those arrangements made for those lawsuits, those girls that are suing… you have to settle it… or you’re going to pay big money. So they are going to get money out of this and they should. They were wronged, they were deeply wronged.”
Under the current system, thousands of California school employees are legally required to be complicit in the system that allows trans athletes in girls’ sports, but also the system that allows males to gender transition without their parents’ consent or knowledge.
Some school employees have been fired for refusing to be complicit.
Bianco has a message for all school employees about how to handle this issue. He encourages school employees to, in the short term, risk their employment by not complying with state laws.
“Stand up and do the right thing,” Bianco said to the state’s school employees. “Thank God we have teachers that are standing up for that, and they’re doing the right thing, and they’re absolutely refusing, and they’re being fired. Take the badge of honor. Because then you sue, like these teachers are doing it, and now we’re finding that they’re winning…
“Your job as an adult is to protect our kids.”
Bianco also warned of consequences to the school employees that do comply if he becomes governor.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
“Absolutely,” Bianco said when asked if he would support consequences to school employees who are complying with the state law on trans athletes in girls’ sports and gender transitions for minors.
“Elected officials are only afraid of one thing, and that’s not getting elected again, and when they know they’re not going to get elected again because they’re harming our girls or they’re not protecting our kids, they’re going to finally be forced to do the right thing, and we’ll make sure these changes are taken care of.”
Follow Fox News Digital’s sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Jackson Thompson is a sports reporter for Fox News Digital covering critical political and cultural issues in sports, with an investigative lens. Jackson’s reporting has been cited in federal government actions related to the enforcement of Title IX, and in legacy media outlets including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Associated Press and ESPN.com.
Coach Prime’s sky-high salary raises eyebrows nationally. Still, I make what I think is a compelling case for Deion Sanders’ worth, highlighting his transformative impact: quadrupling win totals, sparking record ticket sales, and delivering $3 billion in publicity value for Boulder.
Can Colorado’s new faces make the most of these openings, or will persistent injury woes undermine momentum?
Last week, I focused on UC Irvine and Hawai’i. This week, I zero in on the Matadors ahead of their home game on Thursday against the Anteaters.
