Pennsylvania officials reject viral claim about illegal voters

Officials in Pennsylvania have dismissed claims that “illegal voters” were able to request ballots and vote at an election office in Allegheny County.

Officials issued a statement after posts on

The video shows a line outside a satellite election office in Allegheny County — the state’s second-most populous county — and a second smaller group appearing to walk along the long line and speak with someone at the entrance to the election center.

Allegheny County officials told the BBC that the group had come to request mail-in ballots, and officials reiterated that only U.S. citizens can register to vote.

BBC Verify understands that some people in the group seen in the viral video are US citizens of Nepalese and Bhutanese descent. The BBC has not been able to independently verify this.

Viral posts on Some also claimed they were wearing stickers supporting the Harris-Walz campaign, which are not visible in the video.

The video has been viewed by millions of people on X and shared by right-wing influencers, some of whom embrace conspiracy theories.

Tech billionaire Elon Musk, the owner of X, responded to a post with the video: “Is this real?”

It is illegal for non-US citizens to vote in federal elections, and research shows that instances of this happening are extremely rare.

Others speculated online that the group had not only voted illegally, but also skipped the line. But provincial officials told BBC Verify that some in the group “required the assistance of translators.”

Officials say the moments in the viral video were a brief conversation between voters, their translators and a county employee, which was spread online by right-wing influencers.

“The county clerk instructed that the elderly and disabled could be seated while they waited for their application to be processed,” officials said, adding that this was the case for every elderly or disabled voter at each polling station.

Referring to the viral video, they said: “the able-bodied voters returned to the back of the line, elderly and disabled voters were allowed to sit and wait their turn, and those who needed the help of a translator could use their voice translator to help them by helping the process”.

A separate video shared alongside this video shows a man claiming to have been at the voting location at the time and saw the incident happen. We have not been able to verify this video.

Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt said that “spreading videos and other information without context and sharing social posts containing half-truths and even outright lies is harmful to our representative democracy.”

Pennsylvania is a major swing state and has been the focus of claims from right-wing influencers questioning the integrity of the election.

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