From the Texas Tribune:
Three weeks ago, Texas Comptroller Don Huffines signed what he called an executive order aimed at eliminating a “hidden tax” on fees charged by virtual marketplaces to sellers.
“There will be a lot more coming,” Huffines said as he held up a jumbo printed version of the order in front of tax industry members, associations and consultants. “This puts tens of millions of dollars annually back in the pocket of Texas families and small businesses.”
Huffines made good on his promise in the weeks that followed, as he issued three more executive orders. The orders target a tax for medical records, funding for Flock surveillance cameras and ensuring no state dollars support diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.
Except they might be executive orders in name only. The orders themselves direct comptroller’s office staff to start the formal process of changing agency rules, something the comptroller can largely do on his own already.
It is not clear why Huffines is calling the directives executive orders, a unilateral authority that typically rests in the hands of the chief executive at each level of government, whether it is a county judge, Gov. Greg Abbott or President Donald Trump. Huffines’ office did not respond to a list of questions or an interview request.
“They don’t supersede any kind of policymaking from the [Legislature] or orders from the governor — so this is really internal housekeeping more than anything,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a University of Houston political science professor who likened Huffines’ orders to agency memoranda or directives. “He’s trying to amplify the nature of these orders.”
Coming less than five weeks before Election Day, the executive orders are the latest moves from Huffines to garner attention from inside and out of one of the state’s most important agencies, yet one whose charges typically fly below the radar of headlines. Among the office’s tasks are the collection of state taxes, implementation of a new $1 billion private school voucher program and calculation of the state’s revenue, which instructs the Legislature’s budget drafting every two years.
But in the recent orders critics see an attempt by Huffines to reinvent that conventional understanding of the office as the state’s chief financial officer into a more powerful state agency that pushes the limits of its authority, from accounting to setting policy. Since being appointed by the governor to the post in August, the comptroller has fired dozens of people, upended the agency’s structure and embarked on his campaign promises to DOGE the state — all before winning a general election.
Huffines will face Democratic nominee Sarah Eckhardt, a state senator from Austin, for the right to a four-year term in November. In an interview, Eckhardt said Huffines — who unsuccessfully challenged Abbott in 2022 — is “cosplaying” as governor.
“We don’t have two governors. We have one,” Eckhardt said, listing off the comptroller’s responsibilities — like ensuring the state’s contract procurement processes remain above board. “These are important jobs of the comptroller but he doesn’t seem interested in those jobs. He’s fixated on having governor-like powers.”
Huffines’ first order directed agency staff to propose a rule change that would stop applying the state’s data processing tax to fees charged by online marketplaces like eBay and Amazon. Sellers on those platforms pay the tax, from restaurants selling food on DoorDash to vendors selling crafts on Etsy. The comptroller’s office said the customer also paid the tax.
During last year’s legislative session, Rep. Angie Chen Button, R-Garland, introduced a bill that would have similarly excluded certain services from the tax. The bill received a committee hearing, where it was praised by small business owners and representatives from major online retailers like Expedia alike.
But the proposed legislation never advanced out of committee.
Huffines is taking another approach: agency rulemaking.
“Thank you,” Button wrote in a social media post after the comptroller unveiled his directive. “Glad to see momentum behind this effort to make Texas taxes fairer.”
Button’s proposed legislation, House Bill 1681, would have cost the state millions of dollars in revenue, according to the Legislative Budget Board. At the conclusion of the Texas House panel’s hearing on the bill last April, Button told her peers that calculation was “misinformation” and that the state was unfairly taxing people.
The comptroller’s office published the proposed rule change in the latest issue of the Texas Register, the state’s weekly publication of new, amended and withdrawn agency rules. In it, the agency acknowledged the change would cost the state general revenue but argued it would benefit the public “by reducing costs and uncertainty for businesses.”
Huffines made a similar argument in announcing it. “Ending this tax isn’t a cost to government because this money never belonged to the government. You cannot lose what was never yours,” he said.
Huffines’ other orders follow the same approach.
The second, announced Oct. 6, aims to end a tax charged when someone requests medical records, whether the request comes from a patient or doctor. Like with the first order, Huffines told agency staff to begin the agency rule-changing process.
“The proposed amendment shall proceed through the rulemaking process required by
Chapter 2001, Government Code, and this order shall be implemented consistent with that process,” the order states.
The third executive order appears to coincide with an executive order from Abbott. In late August, the governor directed all state agencies to stop funding Flock cameras amid scrutiny over the surveillance technology. The Tribune reported one state agency had devoted some $30 million to bolstering the state’s Flock surveillance network, by giving grants to local police departments.
On Oct. 13, Huffines ordered up a rule change to ban the use of state grant money for the technology. “This Order directs internal agency action. It is not a rule, and it does not impose any obligation on any Grantee, Contractor, or other person or alter the terms of any Grant solicitation, agreement, or award, unless and until rules are adopted in accordance” with the rulemaking process, according to the order.
The fourth order, issued last week, will require state contractors and grantees to assure the state no part of their work involves DEI. The actual order has not yet been posted online. In a press release, Huffines teased more to come and suggested his directives are part of a new day at the comptroller’s office.
“It is the latest in a series of new standard terms Huffines is writing into Comptroller contracts and grants to protect taxpayers and enforce Texas law,” the office said in a news release.
Huffines is not the first comptroller to try scrambling the expectations of the role he is filling, said Rottinghaus, the UH professor. Bob Bullock, perhaps the office’s best-known former occupant, similarly leveraged administrative rules to control, for example, how businesses calculated taxes and how franchise taxes were reported.
It also helps Huffines establish a record, Rottinghaus said, as he tries to pitch himself to voters as an incumbent despite being placed in the role by the governor.
A recent statewide poll from the University of Texas at Austin’s Texas Politics Project placed Huffines one point ahead of Eckhardt, well within the margin of error.
Early voting is underway and runs through Oct. 30. Election Day is Nov. 3.
Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin has been a major financial supporter of The Texas Tribune. University of Houston has been a financial supporter within the past five years. The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in our journalism. Find a complete list of them and more information about our financial and disclosure policies here.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.