Vanity license plates are seldom entertaining. No, your Dodge Challenger’s “M0P4R” plate doesn’t make your car cooler—it just tells everyone you wasted $50 bucks on the least creative idea. Every time someone submits what they think is a hilarious plate, two dozen more people have already had that same string of characters rejected by their state’s DMV. And, every year, various states share a few of those rejected plates. Last year, the No. 1 rejected license plate in most states was Hawk Tuah-related, which I don’t even have a joke for because it’s too depressing.
The office of Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias released some of its 300 rejected plates from 2024, and the first listed was “HOKTUAH.” Turns out that’s just one of many, many ways to fit last year’s most cursed catchphrase into a seven-character space, as we’ll soon find. Also denied in the Prairie State were “THICCAF,” “AXEHOLE,” and, my personal favorite, “UGEWANG.” (OK, that one got me.) One of them was “MUNCH,” which makes me feel like Illinois needs to get its mind out of the gutter. What if they were just born in Munich and wanted to represent?
Here are some of the other rejected plates that Illinois’ DMV revealed:
- GYATT
- BICHIN
- JAGWEED
- BADARSE
- ILLCUTU
- HOHOHOE
- ABADMF
- WEENIE
- DUCKOFF
- SHIDDED
What about Oregon? The DMV rejected 386 custom plate requests, mostly because they were too dirty. But of course “HWKTUA” popped up, like the flipping plague. In Oregon’s defense, there was also “ASSM4N” and, like, c’mon—aren’t there any Seinfeld lovers in Oregon’s DMV? Maybe it’s just because of Portlandia, but I thought people in Oregon had better senses of humor than this.
Here’s the work of Oregon’s brightest license plate writers:
- H0ERUN
- FARTN
- P00P00
- R4WD0G
- B00BAF
- HAWK2A
- 69L0L
News5Cleveland posted every single rejected Ohio vanity plate for 2024 and there are a few doozies in there. The bright side is that I didn’t see any Hawk Tuah plates. The not-so-bright side is that Ohio’s were considerably less creative and far more racist. Do better, Ohio.
Some examples from the Buckeye state:
- GYATTM5
- POOPY 2
- B1G D1LF
- MAFIOSA
- 1FUQU2
- 2FUCT
- LFGO23
- BADB1SH
- KILLZZ
Oddly, Tennessee had quite a few Muppets-based license plate rejections, like “GONZO” and “KERMITT.” While there’s nothing wrong with The Muppets, of course, Tennessee, like most states, has rules against referencing creative works or public figures—which also explains why “SNOOPY1” didn’t make it. Again, though, Hawk Tuah ruled the year in Tennessee, with over 40 different variations of it being submitted. And did someone really think “KDNAPPR” was gonna slip through the cracks?
Here are some of Tennessee’s:
- PHUKOFF
- QANON
- FT LONG
- SHT BOX
- OMFGMOV
- PRNHUB
- NOTACOP
- ASS MAN
- DZZNUTS
- GUNSMOK
Finally, we checked in with Oklahoma to see if it could turn the Hawk Tuah train around and, not a chance. It was funny for 47 seconds, people. Let. It. Go. But it wasn’t just Haliey Welch’s signature catchphrase; there was also the childish “USHUTUP,” the very boomer “DMNKIDS,” and these:
- AWOOOOO
- B00B1ES
- BA5ICAF
- GYAT
- ONLYFAN
- P00P
- RAPTURD
- WAPTUH
- WEDTWUK
- XSMOLPP
I hate to be the “DMNKIDS” guy and say that things were better in my day, but 2024 seems like a down year for amusing rejected vanity plates. And the thing is, you don’t have to go back far—we’ve seen some strong contenders in the recent past. This time around, most of what I came across were racial slurs and the same tired meme, over and over again. We used to be a country.
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