A video shared on TikTok purports former Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton was allegedly caught on tape saying he discarded 2.5 million mail-in ballots in Texas.

@wrong_won♬ original sound – 🔥🔥✨Haus of Petty✨🔥🔥

Verdict: False

The claim appears to refer to a 2021 appearance Paxton made on former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon’s podcast, “War Room.” Paxton conflated general mail-in ballots with applications for mail-in ballots during the 2020 presidential election while speaking on the podcast, according to Newsweek.

Fact Check:

Houston attorney Tony Buzbee will lead Paxton’s impeachment defense in his upcoming trial, according to the Texas Tribune. Paxton was impeached on 20 articles of impeachment with charges including obstruction of justice and constitutional bribery, among others, NBC News reported.

“Ken Paxton is the AG caught on tape saying he discarded 2.5 million mail in ballots in Texas,” text overlay on the TikTok video reads. The speaker in the video does not provide any further detail about the claim but instead mentions recent developments regarding Paxton’s upcoming impeachment trial.

The claim is false and appears to refer to a 2021 appearance Paxton made on Bannon’s podcast, “War Room.”

“Trump won by 620,000 votes in Texas. Harris County mail-in ballots that they wanted to send out were 2.5 million. Those were all illegal and we were able to stop every one of them,” Paxton told Bannon.

Paxton conflated general mail-in ballots with applications for mail-in ballots during the 2020 presidential election while speaking on the podcast, according to Newsweek. Harris County did not mail ballots to registered voters, but applications to request them, the outlet indicated.

In October 2020, the Texas Supreme Court ruled Harris County couldn’t send mail-in ballot applications to all 2.4 million registered voters in the county, the Texas Tribune reported. The state of Texas sued to block County Clerk Chris Hollins from sending mail-in ballot applications in August 2020, the outlet indicated. The court ruled the Election Code did not authorize the mailing Hollins had proposed.

The court also ruled that a government official proactively sending mail-in ballot applications oversteps their authority, according to the outlet. (RELATED: MAGA Inc. Ad Misleads On Ron DeSantis’s Stance On Tax Cuts And Border Wall)

This is not the first time a false claim has circulated online. Back in March, Check Your Fact debunked a Twitter video that allegedly showed evidence of voter fraud in the recent Nigerian election.