Utah to decide if driver's DEPORTM license plate violates state guidelines
Can a vanity license plate that makes a personal statement about illegal immigrants cross the line?
Utah officials said Friday they are reviewing a motorist's “DEPORTM” plate to decide if it violates state guidelines.
"We're not sure how it got through," Tammy Kikuchi, a spokeswoman for the Utah State Tax Commission, which oversees the Utah Division of Motor Vehicles, said, according to The Salt Lake Tribune. "We're really quite surprised."
She confirmed the plate was approved in 2015.
Utah law says vanity plates may not show “contempt, ridicule or superiority of a race, religion, deity, ethnic heritage or political affiliation.”
“I think there’s a wide range of opinions in Utah when it comes to an issue like immigration and that’s a good thing,” Pacenza said, according to Deseret News. “I think it’s good to live in a place where we can express ourselves freely and have a diverse set of attitudes about complex issues, but it doesn’t feel like to me license plates are the right venue for that. And this particular issue just seemed unusually aggressive and confrontational.”
In the last few years, the Utah Tax Commission has banned plate requests like "3MERL0T" "4TWENTY" and “KKKADEN," according to The Tribune.
https://www.foxnews.com/auto/utah-officials-reviewing-vanity-license-plate-to-decide-if-it-violates-guidelines