May 5, 2014

Vanity plate rejections: What’s in your state?

We have Virginia’s list. Now request it from your own DMV!

Written by George LeVines

Edited by Shawn Musgrave

PURPHZE … SNOTRKT … PLAYA69

Besides laying somewhere between jive and utterly misspelled, these three phrases bear something else in common.

In February, MuckRock user Andrew Mickert acquired the list of all requested vanity plates that were rejected by the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles in 2013.

YLL NVR GU3SS WTS 0N1T.

My favorite (printable) attempt so far: APOT2PN

We’ve only glanced at Virginia’s 500-page list. But duplicating this request for DMVs in all 50 states seems only natural, and we figure you may want to help.

Here’s a map of the states that have been funded already. If your state has already been funded (states in red), help us knock out the rest!

DMV map 6pm May 21