Fox News host Maria Bartiromo recently claimed on social media that illegal aliens were registering to vote at Texas Department of Motor Vehicles offices.
“Friend of mine’s wife had to take her 16-year-old son to the DMV this week for a new license. Couldn’t get an online appointment (all full) so went in person and had to go to 3 DMV’s to get something done. First DMV was in Weatherford. Had a massive line of immigrants getting licenses and had a tent and table outside the front door of the DMV registering them to vote! Second one was in Fort Worth with same lines and same Dems out front. Third one was in North Fort Worth had no lines but had same voter registration drive,” Bartiromo wrote on X.
Her post on X garnered significant attention, with 2.1 million views and counting. It has been reposted more than 14,000 times.
Responding to a request for comment, the Texas DMV said:
“The Texas Department of Motor Vehicles (TxDMV) does not issue driver licenses or process voter registration applications. For driver license questions, please contact the Texas Department of Public Safety. For voter registration questions, please contact the Texas Secretary of State.”
Nevertheless, the allegations prompted some Republican organizations to investigate the matter.
“The Parker County GOP has spent the last 24 hours investigating the claims made by Maria Bartiromo on X and subsequently in a segment on her show that a friend witnessed at the Weatherford DPS [Department of Public Safety] office a ‘massive line of immigrants getting licenses and a tent and table setup outside the front door of the DMV registering them to vote!’” Parker County GOP posted on Facebook.
The organization proceeded to list some “facts”:
“1. While we are everyday registering more voters in Parker county, there has been no large submission of registrants consistent with the claim.
2. All voter registration applications in the county are processed by the county EA office (County Voter Registrar) and are uploaded to SOS to verify the applicants eligibility to vote (i.e., citizenship, etc.). Not only have there been no recent instances of ineligible individuals attempting to register in Parker county, there have only been two in the last 15 years.
3. The DPS office has confirmed that there have been no tents or tables and no one registering voters on their premises, and that if it were the case, they would be told to leave, as it is not allowed.”
Sgt. William Lockridge, a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram that Bartiromo’s statement was “simply false.”
“Just because these people aren’t white, that doesn’t mean they’re illegal,” he added, claiming that the allegation was “kind of racist.”
CORRECTION: A previous iteration of this article noted that the Texas DMV did not respond to a request for comment when they in fact had. This article was updated on August 21, 2024, at 1:40 p.m. to include the agency’s response.