Bishop City Council: Schwartz Leads Muchovej 419–394; School Board Rankings Shift After First Count

UPDATED NOVEMBER 5 — FOURTH UNOFFICIAL COUNTY REPORT. In the city of Bishop’s two-seat council contest, the Inyo County 12:13 a.m. November 4 report lists Karen Schwartz with 419 candidate selections (33.93%), Stephen J.C. Muchovej with 394 (31.90%), Tyler Beadle with 240 (19.43%) and Aaron Schat with 182 (14.74%). The rankings are unchanged from the first count, but the figures have increased. The difference between Muchovej in the second listed position and Beadle in third is 154 candidate selections. These are vote-for-two selection shares, not percentages of the number of residents who voted.

Bishop Unified’s school-board count also changed

In the separate three-seat school-district race, the current snapshot lists Claudia Moya-Tanner 1,605, Virginia Figueroa 1,408, Joshua R. Nicholson 1,286, Tyler McManus 1,086 and Scott Gadea 887. Importantly, Nicholson moved to the third ranked position after the first report had McManus just one selection ahead of him. See the new detailed Bishop school-board story.

Why Bishop voters must watch the November 6 update

Inyo County’s elections office expects to add more valid mail ballots to its next report on November 6. The countywide unprocessed-ballot estimate exceeds 3,000; not all those ballots belong to either Bishop contest, so the number cannot be used to forecast an individual race. Read our ballot-processing explainer. All figures remain unofficial.

Sources: Fourth Inyo County unofficial summary; official results page.

Earlier November 3 first mail-ballot report

BISHOP, Inyo County — November 4, 2026. Bishop residents voted for two City Council seats on November 3, while Bishop Unified voters also chose school trustees. The first county report includes early mail voting only, so it should be read as a time-stamped snapshot, not an election-night final tally.

City Council: two seats at stake

The Inyo County 8 p.m. first summary reproduced by Sierra Wave listed Karen Schwartz with 344 votes, Stephen J.C. Muchovej with 324, Tyler Beadle with 153 and Aaron Schat with 117. Each voter could cast up to two council votes, so the totals do not correspond to a single-winner percentage of voters.

Bishop Unified’s five-candidate contest

The same first early-ballot report shows Claudia Moya-Tanner 1,281, Virginia Figueroa 1,099, Tyler McManus 863, Joshua Nicholson 862 and Scott Gadea 582, with three trustee seats available. The one-vote gap between McManus and Nicholson in this preliminary release shows how sensitive the ranking is to subsequent votes.

Later reports exist

Inyo Elections has also posted a later 12:13 a.m. fourth summary; these first-report figures must not be presented as current totals for that later release. The county elections results page is the authoritative location for those updated documents and the official canvass.

All totals in this report are unofficial election-night snapshots, not certified results. Precincts reporting does not necessarily mean every eligible mail, provisional, or signature-cure ballot has been counted.

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