Democrats are letting noncitizens vote illegally.
Posted by Real Time with Bill Maher, Checked
- Sources
- 5 contradict1 context
- Said
- 1 time·
- Confidence
- 30%
Real Time with Bill MaherOct 24, 2026
The claim departs from the passage: the speaker says Republicans are making a mistake pursuing noncitizen-voting concerns, and never says Democrats are letting noncitizens vote illegally, so the verdict is unverifiable as an extraction.
Our two reads of who says this, and how, disagree, so it counts as the post's own claim.
This claim is about the present, so it is judged as of the day it was checked.
What was said
… The DHS did. They thought there were 16,000 non-citizens illegally registered. They did a big follow-up. It turned out 185, not 16,000. They did another follow-up. Turned out it wasn't 185; it was zero. Zero. With these kind of numbers, don't you think the Republicans are making a big mistake, as well as a moral mistake, pursuing this avenue? Yeah, I think it's crazy to lift this up as some kind of central issue. Look, of course we've got to enforce the law. It's illegal to vote if you're not a citizen, but I agree with your point about the proportionality. …
Real Time with Bill Maher · · from the transcriptPost →What we found
Contradicts. Snopes and the Washington Post both report that noncitizen voting is rare and that the DHS and similar allegations of Democratic-enabled noncitizen voting were denied or lacked evidence.[1][3]
Contradicts. A Washington Post analysis of more than 180 noncitizen voting cases found isolated incidents with no organized Democratic effort to draw noncitizens to the polls.[5]
Contradicts. NPR reports there is no evidence that Democrats are purposefully letting migrants in so they will vote, and fact-checkers found a 2025 lawsuit claim that Democrats sought to allow noncitizen voting was false.[4][6]
Context. The passage is the speaker arguing that Republicans are making a big and moral mistake by focusing on noncitizen voting; it does not assert that Democrats are letting noncitizens vote illegally.
Context. Some noncitizen voting does occur in a few localities for local elections and in isolated federal cases, which is a narrow kernel and not evidence of a Democratic scheme.[2][5]
Sources
6 sources: 2 fact-checkers, 2 tier 2, 2 not rated
- 1Noncitizens don't vote in large numbers in US elections. Here's proofsnopes.com · fact-checker · cited for: contradicts
- 2Republicans push for noncitizen voting ban in Congress. ...politifact.com · fact-checker · cited for: context
- 3How Trump and his allies are sowing doubt ahead of the ...washingtonpost.com · tier 2 · cited for: contradicts
- 4Fact checking false claims about noncitizen voting : NPRnpr.org · tier 2 · cited for: contradicts
- 5We studied 180 voter-fraud cases. Many charged cite honest mistakesdetroitnews.com · not rated · cited for: contradicts, context
- 6FACT FOCUS: Democratic leaders’ challenge to Trump’s election executive order misrepresented onlinethetimes-tribune.com · not rated · cited for: contradicts
Where this claim was made
Said in 1 published post
Related claims
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- Illegal immigrants are voting in elections in the United States.True