WASHINGTON — High prices and affordability have emerged as major issues in the race between Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar and his Republican challenger, Webb County Judge Tano Tijerina, for Texas’ 28th congressional district, which stretches from the San Antonio suburbs to the Mexico border.

In a new campaign ad, Tijerina boasts that he has lowered property taxes nearly a half dozen times. But have the tax bills of Webb County residents actually gone down?

In the campaign, Tijerina said he has worked to make life better as Webb County judge.

“I expanded the Meals on Wheels program for seniors, provided millions in utility relief to keep water and electric bills low and lowered property taxes five times for working families,” Tijerina said in the ad. 

Spectrum News examined one of Tijerina’s key claims. During his time as judge, the county’s property tax rate did go down five times. But during those years, the tax bills of county residents, on average, went up.

“If the values are going up at a higher percentage than the rate is being reduced in percentage terms, then tax bills, on average, will be higher,” said Lynn Krebs, a research economist at the Texas Real Estate Research Center at Texas A&M University. 

That is what happened in Webb County. A look at the county’s no-new-revenue rate confirms this. In a time of rising property values, the no-new-revenue figure is the tax rate that would be needed to generate the same amount of money as the previous year from the exact same properties.

Krebs said a jurisdiction’s chief appraiser provides the no-new-revenue rate before adopting a tax rate for the year. 

In Webb County, there were eight years where the property tax rate did not fall as much as the no-new-revenue rate declined, resulting in higher tax revenues and, on average, higher property tax bills.  

“If property values in total went up by 5%, then you have to reduce last year’s tax rate by 5%. Not five pennies, but by 5% in order for the the math to end up with the same revenue, and that really is what you know it comes down to in regards to year-over-year property tax change,” Krebs said.  

When asked for a comment, Tijerina’s campaign manager Nick Engstrom said in a statement, “Spectrum’s own analysis confirms the fact: Judge Tijerina cut the county tax rate five times. A county judge sets the tax rate, not a home’s appraisal, and Judge Tijerina used every tool he had to fight for taxpayers while our opponent Henry Cuellar has spent decades enriching himself.” 

Cuellar’s campaign declined to comment on Tijerina’s property tax rate reduction boast.

Cuellar, a member of the powerful appropriation committee, touted the same home energy assistance and senior meal services that Tijerina did in his ad. 

On social media last week, Cuellar said, “I’ll continue working through my position on the House Appropriations Committee to protect these investments, fight harmful cuts and bring federal dollars back to Webb County.” 

Both programs are federally funded. 

According to the Laredo Morning Times, Cuellar and Tijerina appeared together in March of last year for the groundbreaking of a project benefiting the Meals on Wheels program. 

In a statement, Madison Andrus, a press secretary with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said, “Tano Tijerina has long been one of Henry Cuellar’s biggest fans. It’s easy to see why – Congressman Cuellar has brought billions of dollars back home to South Texas including for utility cost relief and Meals on Wheels. Tano is lying to voters because unlike Congressman Cuellar, he has no accomplishments of his own that he can run on. Texas voters know that Congressman Cuellar has delivered for them time and time again, and that’s why they’re going to send him back to Congress in November.” 

Tijerina’s campaign has said it was him who delivered services on the ground. 

Tijerina told Spectrum News’ James Barragan in June, “We go out and get those grants, and then he’s got a tickler system, and what does he do? He acts like he brings the money.” 

His campaign went on to say, “If Congressman Cuellar wants to compare records, no amount of DCCC spin changes his: he was indicted, his brother was indicted for siphoning profits off more than $500,000 in government contracts, and Cuellar funneled his own campaign cash into his brother’s sheriff races.”

Voters will have to consider the records of these two politicians, who are vying for a South Texas seat that could determine control of the U.S. House. 

Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to more accurately reflect the source of the Democratic campaign statement. (Aug. 18, 2026)