Not in Texas. I can basically guarantee that this is in houston, they are all over the place down there. They're called elbows or swangas and are popular throughout the "slow loud and bangin"(slab) car culture native to the area.

You can literally mount real bull horns to your hood over there

Depends on what state you live in if there are mandatory vehicle inspections (20 of 50 states do NOT have vehicle inspections). The state I live in does not have any mandatory vehicle inspections.

i have never in my 24 years of owning and driving 13 cars while living in two US states experienced such a mandatory check.

I've very distant memories of emissions tests but that was strictly exhaust or OBDII checks specifically for emissions.

Never safety or roadworthiness.

Some of them are surprisingly legal, depending on the width of the car. They're popular in Houston, and so long as the total width of the vehicle doesn't exceed 102 inches they may be legal in Texas. Lots of them do make the vehicle wider than 8 feet, but for probable cause it has to be glaringly obvious they're over 102 inches, and that's not always legally clear. They mostly get tickets for them if they get pulled over for something else and the cops measure them during the stop.

And Texas no longer requires inspections as of like 2 years ago. But they could just remove them before inspections before anyway.

There are no more standards in america if your liked.