California GOP Governor Candidate Flails After Brutal Live Fact-Check

Wannabe California governor Chad Bianco tried to pull a trump card during a GOP CNN debate, and ended up humiliated on live TV.

During a prolonged exchange with host Kaitlan Collins, the MAGA-aligned Riverside County sheriff vehemently denied that he ever accused his Republican rival, GOP frontrunner Steve Hilton, of “swindling” his way into the Republican arena. But Collins had the receipts, and read them as Hilton stood just feet away.

“I saw the two of you chatting earlier, you and Mr. Hilton. You’ve actually had some harsh words for your fellow Republican,” Collins said. “You’ve called him ‘unethical and dishonest’ and said that he is trying to ‘manipulate Californians’ and ‘swindled his way into the Republican side.’ Are you saying that you don’t think Republican voters can trust Mr. Hilton?”

“I don’t know where that came from. I would tell you, in my entire life I don’t think I’ve used the word ‘swindle,’” Bianco said. “So I don’t know if you were quoting something or if you were saying that—if you were saying that.”

“It’s a quote from you to The Atlantic,” Collins clarified.

Hilton, a California businessman who previously worked for British Prime Minister David Cameron, has been endorsed by Donald Trump. He is currently tied in the polls with Democrat Xavier Becerra, pulling roughly 18 percent of the vote.

Bianco tried to qualify his language, and in doing so again denied having ever used the word “swindle.”

“I don’t know where that came from. I would never, I would never use the word ‘swindled,’” he stuttered.

He then claimed he was the only person on the stage whose job—as local law enforcement—revolved around the truth, noting that “right now lying can get me removed from my job.”

But Collins offered more specifics, quoting directly from an interview that Bianco did with KBAK in March in which the sheriff asserted that Hilton was trying to figure out how he can “manipulate Californians to put him in this position at a time when we know that California Democrats have failed and we are going to vote for a Republican governor, and he has swindled his way into the Republican side, even though he’s not.”

“I probably did say that,” Bianco admitted. “I didn’t use the word ‘swindle’, whatever it was. But that context, I will agree with that 100 percent.”

“So you did say the quote?” Collins pressed.

“Sure,” Bianco said.

It would be a shocking turn of events if Bianco’s blustery performance did anything but hurt him at the polls. During the same debate, the 58-year-old touted his Oath Keeper alliance until one of his opponents, Democrat Antonio Villaraigosa, reminded him that the extremist militia group participated in the January 6 insurrection.

“You’re an Oath Keeper. We all know that,” Villaraigosa said.

“And I’m very proud of it,” Bianco interjected.

“I don’t think an Oath Keeper is qualified to be governor,” Villaraigosa continued.

Bianco later said he had sworn an oath three times “to defend my Constitution.”

“To everyone who wants to lie and get emotionally spun up about the Oath Keeper organization, I want you to go read the mission statement—” Bianco continued, before he was interrupted by another voice on stage: “I saw them on CNN attacking the Capitol.”

“Do you still consider yourself a member of that group, to be clear?” asked Collins.

“No,” Bianco replied.

Vice President JD Vance just reminded everyone what a charisma-less vacuum he is.

Speaking Tuesday at a manufacturing facility in Iowa, Vance stumbled through a speech attempting to boost Zach Nunn, a Republican running for reelection to the House.

“When I see that—when I see Iowa farmers who need to get that E-15 to market, what is, uh, this, what is, uh … Zach, you’re gonna have to help me out with her name here. I lost my page here. Alright. OK, there we go!” Vance said.

The crowd seemed fairly unimpressed with Vance’s riffing. The room stayed silent as Vance struggled, and video showed the people behind him half-heartedly holding up signs and looking around.

There are those of us old enough to remember in 2024 when Vance tried to congratulate himself for not needing to refer to notes while on the campaign trail.

“Ma’am, I don’t need a teleprompter, I’ve actually got thoughts in my head, unlike Kamala Harris,” Vance told the crowd in Erie, Pennsylvania.

Moments later in that speech, Vance mixed up Abbey Gate, the location of a horrific suicide bombing in 2021, with Abbey Road, the location of The Beatles’ London recording studio.

At least one Indiana Republican is still standing firm in his opposition to Trump after the president successfully enacted his revenge on the state’s Republicans blocking his redistricting efforts.

Trump-endorsed candidates won five of the seven state Senate primary races on Tuesday, a resounding victory for the president in an openly confrontational primary. But even in the face of a MAGA takeover in his state, Indiana Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray—whom Trump has been lambasting for months as a “total loser”—plans to stay and fight for his party, confirming his intentions to run for reelection in 2028.

“I do plan to run for pro tem again. And I, at this point, I need to make the case for whether, if I’m the right person to lead the caucus and the Senate, and we’ll see where that goes. I don’t make a forecast on that,” Bray told Politico on Wednesday.

Bray said he still believes he’s the right person to lead the Republican Party in Indiana, and refused to comment further on what the purging of his colleagues on Tuesday night means for the wider party.

But whether he’ll say so publicly or not, Bray will certainly have an uphill battle, as the target on his back and the momentum Trump has will make it hard to win his state back,.

President Trump’s about-face on Iran caught his Cabinet members off guard.

Trump announced Tuesday evening that he was pausing “Project Freedom,” his plan for U.S. Navy ships to escort other vessels out of the Strait of Hormuz, for a “short period of time” in order to help negotiations with Iran.

In a Truth Social post, Trump said that “we have mutually agreed that, while the Blockade will remain in full force and effect, Project Freedom (The Movement of Ships through the Strait of Hormuz) will be paused for a short period of time to see whether or not the Agreement can be finalized and signed. President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

But only hours before, administration officials were publicly explaining and praising the plan.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio each touted the idea to reopen the strait in press conferences earlier in the day on Tuesday.

“Two U.S. commercial ships, along with American destroyers, have already safely transited the Strait, showing the lane is clear. We know the Iranians are embarrassed by this fact. They said they control the Strait. They do not,” Hegseth said, claiming that “hundreds more ships from nations around the world are lining up” to leave the strait with U.S. help.

“We maintain the upper hand, and Project Freedom only strengthens that hand,” Hegseth added, only for Trump to shelve the plan hours later.

At a different press conference, Rubio said the plan was key to ending the war with Iran.

“Operation Epic Fury is concluded. We achieved the objectives of that operation,” Rubio said. “We’re not cheering for an additional situation to occur. We would prefer the path of peace. What the president would prefer is a deal.”

Rubio said that Project Freedom would be offensive, and that the U.S. would not fire at Iran “unless we’re shot at.”

But yet again, Trump has changed his mind and hung his surrogates out to dry. The fate of the Iran war continues to be uncertain as the president claims that the war is over, yet swings between offering threats and new updates in negotiations.

Donald Trump’s Department of Justice was forced Tuesday to clean up acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s outrageous lie about the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Speaking to Fox News on April 21, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche claimed that the government had “no information” to suggest the SPLC had “shared what they learned” from their undercover informant program in hate groups such as the KKK with law enforcement.

The SPLC hit back at Blanche’s claim with a motion to retract his false statement, and refrain from making any others like it.

In a filing Tuesday, the DOJ cited a statement Blanche made days later on Fox News Sunday with Shannon Bream. “It is true that over the years they have selectively shared with law enforcement. That’s well documented and there’s no dispute there. They aren’t charged with any of that conduct,” Blanche said.

“To the extent that any clarification was needed, Acting Attorney Todd Blanche’s remarks on a major Sunday television program certainly suffice,” the filing stated.

This is just the latest bit of graceless leadership from Blanche, who actively undermined the Justice Department’s flimsy case against former FBI Director James Comey on Sunday, and is part of a larger trend of unprecedented prosecutorial missteps in the department, undermining numerous civil and criminal cases.

Even the president’s Cabinet is having a hard time subscribing to what Donald Trump is saying about Pope Leo XIV.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio attempted to cover for his MAGA boss, telling a reporter at the White House Tuesday that she had mischaracterized Trump’s recent barbs against the Catholic leader.

“The president recently said that the pope is endangering a lot of Catholics as a result of his rhetoric around the Iran war. Is that a sentiment—” the reporter began, before Rubio cut her off.

“I don’t think that’s an accurate description of what he said,” Rubio interjected. “I think what the president basically said is that Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon because they would use it against places that have a lot of Catholics and Christians and others, for that matter.”

But Rubio was wrong—that is exactly what Trump said.

“I think he’s endangering a lot of Catholics and a lot of people,” Trump said in a Monday interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. “But I guess if it’s up to the pope, he thinks it’s just fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

It was just the latest in a long string of attacks that Trump has made against the pope. Last month, Trump wrote on Truth Social that the religious leader was “weak on crime and terrible for foreign policy.”

The Chicago-born pontiff upset the president and a number of Trump’s underlings when he advocated for world peace earlier this year. The Pentagon reportedly threatened a Holy See ambassador in January, days after the pope made antiwar remarks during his State of the World address.

Leo has brushed off Trump’s remarks, claiming that he has “no fear” of the Trump administration or of “speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel,” though the Vatican did reject a White House invitation to host the pope for America’s 250th anniversary on July 4.

“I will continue to speak out loudly against war, looking to promote peace, ⁠promoting dialogue and multilateral ​relationships among the states to look ​for just solutions to problems,” the pope told reporters aboard a flight in April. “Too many people are suffering in the world today. Too many innocent ‌people ⁠are being killed. And I think someone has to stand up and say there’s a better way.”

It’s very possible that Iran wouldn’t have an enriched uranium stockpile capable of developing nuclear weaponry if it weren’t for Trump’s ascent to the White House.

Iran lacked a single bomb’s worth of uranium in 2018, three years after former President Barack Obama brokered the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to limit the country’s enormous uranium stockpile. That changed when Trump withdrew the U.S. from the pact that year and imposed a series of tough economic sanctions against the Middle East country.

By 2025, Iran had curated an 11-ton stockpile of enriched uranium, the whereabouts of which remain largely unknown. The total stockpile could create as many as 10 bombs if fully enriched, according to a 2025 assessment by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

President Trump’s administration is targeting The New York Times, claiming that the newspaper discriminates against white men.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the newspaper in federal court Tuesday on behalf of a white man who alleged his race and sex were factors in being denied a promotion, violating the Civil Rights Act. A spokesperson for the publication, Danielle Rhoades Ha, called the allegations “politically motivated.”

“The New York Times categorically rejects the meritless and politically motivated allegations that the Trump administration’s E.E.O.C. is pursuing against us,” Rhoades Ha said. “Our employment practices are merit-based and focused on recruiting and promoting the best talent in the world.”

According to the Times, the white employee filed his complaint in July 2025 with the EEOC office in New York, but the office later transferred the complaint to an Alabama investigator. Since then, the commission had been investigating the Times, with the two sides sending information back and forth.

The two were briefly engaged in a voluntary mediation process known as conciliation, the paper said, which usually takes place after the EEOC finds “reasonable cause” that discrimination has occurred. If conciliation fails, then the EEOC decides whether to file a lawsuit.

While the complaint began as a general look at the newspaper’s hiring and promotions, the case, personally handled by EEOC Chair Andrea Lucus, soon became a specific question over whether the white employee did not get a deputy editor job. On April 21, the EEOC told the newspaper that the case had been referred to the agency’s legal unit.

It’s the latest attack by the Trump administration against media outlets that criticize the president, and it’s not the first time they have invoked diversity, equity, and inclusion in the process. The FCC is currently investigating NBC’s parent company, Comcast, over alleged DEI practices, and last month, commissioner Brendan Carr announced an investigation into DEI practices at Disney, ABC’s parent company.

Trump has long hated the Times for how it has covered him, filing a $15 billion defamation lawsuit against the paper last year, and calling the paper “the failing New York Times” for at least a decade. Now, he’s using the power of his office against them.

President Trump is pushing the Food and Drug Administration to approve flavored vapes as his approval rating with young people continues to tumble.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump expressed frustration with FDA Commissioner Marty Makary on the phone over the weekend and in the White House on Monday. Makary has refused to approve blueberry, mango, and menthol vape flavors from manufacturer Glas out of concern the flavors would be too marketable to young and underage users. This puts a real wrench in Trump’s 2024 campaign pledge to “save vaping,” and in his quest to win back the youth vote. Recent polling suggests that the president has lost virtually all of the gains he made with youth in 2024, sitting at a dismal 24 percent approval rating with Gen Z.

The Journal’s report raises doubts about Makary’s job security, with people familiar with the conversations saying the FDA commissioner is on thin ice. The White House has publicly said otherwise, claiming President Trump is “thrilled with his accomplishments.”

The Miami U.S. attorney’s office is in turmoil.

The legal office has steered resources away from criminal cases in order to aid Donald Trump’s personal revenge tour, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

The decision to explicitly aid Trump’s agenda has triggered a mass exodus of staff, hamstringing the department’s ability to prosecute white-collar crime and narcotics trafficking cases, according to more than a dozen sources that spoke with the outlet.

Several dozen attorneys have already left the Southern District of Florida since Trump returned to office, either by quitting, retiring, or being fired by the current administration. One unit focused on prosecuting economic crimes lost roughly half of its staff, reported Bloomberg.

The Justice Department has issued different figures. So far, the DOJ has recorded just 26 departures since Jason Reding Quiñones took over as U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida in August 2025.

Two months after he was confirmed by Congress, Reding Quiñones filed more than two dozen subpoenas to U.S. officials that took part in the 2016 Russian election interference inquiry, which has been internally redefined among Trump loyalists as the “grand conspiracy.” The unsubstantiated theory turns Trump’s legal challenges on their head, positing that the real-life charges—and Trump’s fleeting comeuppance—were a part of a groundless scheme by Democrats and “deep-state” operatives to destroy Trump and his political movement.

The district has become the epicenter of Trump’s political retribution since Reding Quiñones took over, but it’s far from the only office to massively reorient its resources under pressure by Trump’s White House. The Department of Homeland Security has had to move away from other missions in order to abet Trump’s deportation plans; the Department of Defense shifted billions of dollars to fund Trump’s border mission; and more than 6,000 FBI agents were diverted to handling “immigration-related matters,” effectively redefining the agency’s work.

The Justice Department has also dropped thousands of criminal cases in an attempt to funnel its efforts—almost singularly—toward convicting immigration cases. Altogether, the chief law enforcement agency closed some 23,000 criminal cases in the first six months of Trump’s term, including investigations into terrorism, white-collar crimes, and drugs, while prosecuting 32,000 new immigration cases.

The shift in priorities is an indication that “making America safe again” is not necessarily as much of a goal for the current administration as Trump has promised. At the president’s direction, federal authorities have arrested thousands of noncriminal immigrants across the country, despite repeated pledges that the deportation purge is focused on the “worst of the worst”—such as “murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, and terrorists.”

The Supreme Court’s gutting of the Voting Rights Act last week came about thanks to a conspiracy theorist who participated in the Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021. 

Democracy Docket reports that Phillip “Bert” Callais, the lead plaintiff in Louisiana v. Callais, has long claimed U.S. elections are rigged on social media. Callais posted photos and video from the scene at the infamous “Stop the Steal” protest prior to the 2021 Capitol riot, and his Facebook page is full of MAGA and right-wing content, including attacks on vaccines and anything to the left of President Trump. 

It’s a sharp contrast to the original legal complaint that ultimately reached the Supreme Court. Callais is described there as a “non–African American voter” from Brusly, Louisiana, whose congressional district changed after his state redrew its districts. Callais also said that he was a member of a local board of supervisors in 2024.  

In reality, Callais seems to be a partisan activist steeped in the right’s conspiracy theories regarding elections. On X, he commented on an Elon Musk post in December 2025, writing, “This is f#€king insane, non citizens voting in our country.” In February of this year, he expressed doubt in election security, and in January, he called the voting system “manipulated,” touting hand-counted paper ballots as a solution. 

Callais also dismissed concerns about how eliminating mail-in voting would hurt disabled or elderly voters, posting in February, “Find someone to haul you to the polls. Don’t let your disability put the rest of the country at risk.” 

On Sunday, only days after the Supreme Court’s ruling, election denier Seth Keshel, featured in The New York Times for his voter fraud claims, posted a photo to X of him shaking hands with Callais. 

All of this seems to reveal a plot by conservatives to change how Americans vote in order to satisfy debunked conspiracy theories. With the right plaintiff, Republican politicians and wealthy donors can push through a tailored legal case to undo laws that protect elections from partisan interference. Callais seems to have been ready and willing.