Comptroller Huffines Bars State Grant Money From License Plate Cameras and DEI

Texas Comptroller Don Huffines has signed two executive orders in three days that set new conditions on the grants and contracts his office administers. The first, signed Tuesday, bars grant money from paying for license plate cameras. The second, announced Thursday, requires contractors and grantees to certify that none of their work for the state involves what the order calls discriminatory diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

The camera order

Under Tuesday’s order, grantees may not spend Comptroller grant money to buy or contract for Flock cameras, automated license plate readers or any other system that “converts license plates or other images into computer-readable data,” the office said. Nor may they use the money to enter, extend or renew such a contract. The order names products sold by Flock Safety, Motorola Solutions and Axon Enterprise, and it applies to all future Comptroller grants.

“The government has no business tracking where law-abiding Texans drive,” Huffines said. “Doing it without a warrant is a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution.” He added that Texans “should be able to drive to work, to church, or to the grocery store without a government camera logging it in a database.”

The DEI order

Thursday’s order defines discriminatory DEI as “disparate treatment based on race, color, ethnicity, religion, age, sex, or national origin in recruiting, hiring, contracting, program participation, or the use of state resources.” Contractors and grantees must certify that they comply with state and federal anti-discrimination law and run no program that violates it. The office said it is writing authority into its agreements to terminate them immediately for a violation.

Huffines said his office “handles thousands of contracts and grants for hundreds of state agencies and thousands of local governments.” He called the targeted programs “a racket” and said, “Texas is a merit state, not a quota state.”

What comes next

The office described the two orders as part of “a series of new standard terms” Huffines is writing into Comptroller contracts and grants. Neither release named the grant programs affected, their dollar value, or the law that authorizes the comptroller to set the conditions by executive order.

Both orders rest on the same premise: the money in those grants belongs to Texas taxpayers, and Texas officials decide what it may buy.