A growing movement on the political left is targeting elected county sheriffs—the last local law enforcement officials chosen directly by voters—through legislation, ballot measures, and funding networks, according to a new analysis from PJ Media.
The effort, largely concentrated on the West Coast but expanding into other states, seeks to undermine the constitutional authority of sheriffs and shift power from voters to appointed officials and oversight committees, the outlet reported.
Washington State as a Testing Ground
Washington state has become a focal point for these efforts. The state’s Democrat-controlled legislature passed a law—signed by Gov. Bob Ferguson, a former attorney general—that subjects elected sheriffs to review by a hand-picked committee that determines whether they are “qualified.” The committee’s criteria are vague enough to include what it might construe as “hate speech,” according to the report.
In Seattle, a 2020 ballot measure—approved at the height of the defund-the-police movement—effectively stripped the King County sheriff of independent authority, placing the office under the control of the county executive. The sheriff now must defer to the executive on staffing, pay, budget priorities, and policy, including whether to cooperate with federal agencies like the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, and ICE.
In nearby Tacoma, the city council placed a measure on the November ballot to remove the election of the Pierce County sheriff from voters’ hands entirely. The move targets Sheriff Keith Swank, a 30-plus-year Seattle Police Department veteran who was elected by county residents. If the measure passes, Swank would lose the final two years of his term.
Funding Behind the Push
The report alleges that the drive to curtail sheriffs is backed by a network of left-leaning nonprofit groups, particularly those formerly associated with Arabella Advisors. After facing scrutiny from conservatives and Congress last fall, Arabella restructured, with its fiscal-sponsorship business becoming Sunflower Services and its consulting arm becoming Vital Impact—a move the report suggests was designed to obscure its projects and avoid public accountability.
Seamus Bruner of the Government Accountability Institute warned in a recent Hillsdale College speech that Arabella and its subgroups are leading a program to go after democratically elected sheriffs. He noted that while the left is becoming more militarized and organized, it is simultaneously removing the power of the electorate over the last elected law enforcement officer.
The funding trail, according to the report, runs from Sunflower Services to partner funds like the New Venture Fund, Hopewell Fund, and Windward Fund, and then to justice groups such as the States United Democracy Center and local “oversight” commissions. The States United Democracy Center, formerly known as the Voter Protection Program, was co-created by Norm Eisen, a key figure in the impeachment efforts against former President Donald Trump.
Ground-Level Pressure Campaigns
On the ground, groups including the Sheriff Accountability Action group, the Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations, the Los Angeles County Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission, and the Riverside County Democratic Party have pressured sheriffs, notably Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who ran against Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The report frames these efforts as an attempt to subvert the growing “constitutional sheriffs” movement, which holds that sheriffs are the top law enforcement authority in their counties and can decide what is constitutional or not. The report suggests that eliminating elected sheriffs altogether would sidestep such constitutional questions.
Federal Grants Allegedly Fuel the Effort
Under the Biden administration, the Department of Justice allegedly supported these kinds of groups with grants, according to the report. Congressional testimony from Scott Walter, executive director of the Capital Research Center, highlighted DOJ grants to the Acacia Center for Justice, which was spun off from the Vera Institute, a Soros-backed group known for its soft-on-crime and soft-on-immigration advocacy. The report says these programs received nearly a billion dollars to obstruct immigrant detention, electronic surveillance, and cooperation between local police and federal authorities.
“This is what the left’s ‘democracy’ looks like,” the report concludes, urging voters to pay attention before their ability to elect local law enforcement is eroded further.
Source: pjmedia.com — https://pjmedia.com/victoria-taft/2026/08/12/the-left-is-coming-for-your-county-sheriff-n4956074
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