Incumbent Rep. Henry Cuellar’s (D-TX) campaign and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee are facing criticism from Republican candidate Tano Tijerina’s campaign over a new advertisement, which Tijerina’s campaign says misrepresents his comments and makes a false claim about a proposed data center tied to his wife’s family.
Cuellar’s ad features Tijerina saying that “data centers are extremely good,” but his full comment was, “Data centers are extremely good with regulation.”
The ad also claims Tijerina “doesn’t care” if data centers “take our water” and raise electricity prices. Tijerina has publicly pledged to “protect our water, land, and rural communities from data centers and developments that take more than they give” and signed the Ratepayer Protection Pledge. During his tenure as Webb County Judge, no data center has come before the Commissioners Court.
The ad further claims Tijerina’s family “planned to build a data center in South Texas.” However, a square labeled “data center” was mistakenly superimposed on the Talise development plan “without the owner’s prior knowledge or approval” and “its inclusion was an error.” No company has applied to build a data center in Laredo, and the developer’s attorney said there are no plans for one.
Tijerina told Breitbart News, “In trying to slander my wife and her family, Henry Cuellar exposed exactly who he is: a desperate liar who will do anything to hold onto what little power he has left. The decades of corruption that got him indicted in Washington are now showing up in his campaign. He’s throwing shade so you’ll look past his sins against his own wife, against this country, and against this community.”
“But the voters of District 28 are not stupid, no matter what Henry thinks,” Tijerina continued. “We have the facts. He has fiction. Truth matters, and it’s time to send Henry home.”
“The record Cuellar is trying to distract from is a matter of public record: a federal indictment for bribery and money laundering, cartel money in his campaign, a brother indicted over a $500,000 taxpayer contract, and deputies pressured to bankroll the family or lose their jobs. Henry Cuellar belongs in prison, not in Congress,” he explained.
Tijerina campaign manager Nick Engstrom said in a statement to Breitbart News, “This is Henry Cuellar’s MO: lie and deceive to run away from his own decades of corruption. He doctored a video, invented a data center that doesn’t exist, and dragged a candidate’s wife and her family into it. That’s not a campaign — that’s desperation. And it’s the same shady character that got him federally indicted and branded as head of the Cuellar Family Cartel”
The dispute over data centers also comes as campaign finance records show Cuellar’s campaign has accepted $234,500 from political committees connected to corporations involved in data centers, their infrastructure, energy supply, consulting, telecommunications, or related technologies.
Those contributions span more than two decades and include political committees connected to Amazon, Microsoft, Intel, Verizon, Deloitte, Honeywell, Duke Energy, Leidos, Cummins, Jacobs Engineering, and Cox Enterprises, among others.
Several of the companies are directly involved in the data center industry. Amazon Web Services says it is “building data centers to support the next generation of artificial intelligence (AI) innovation,” while Microsoft says it operates more than 300 data centers in more than 34 countries. Intel offers data center solutions, Deloitte provides data center services, Cummins supplies generators and power systems for data centers, and Jacobs provides data center infrastructure design and implementation.
Other companies whose political committees contributed to Cuellar are involved in supplying infrastructure or services to data centers. Honeywell develops hardware and software for data center power management, Duke Energy provides electricity to data centers, and Leidos is involved in data center development and power systems.
Verizon announced a $1 billion deal with Google in July 2026 involving fiber connectivity for data centers, while Cox Business offers colocation and other data center services.
The records show contributions continuing through 2026, including $5,000 from Deloitte’s political action committee on May 22; Leidos contributions of $1,000 and $2,500 on June 15 and another $1,500 on June 30; and $2,000 from Honeywell’s political committee on June 15.