Texas House Government Efficiency Committee to Review Cyber Command, AI Fraud Detection and Data Privacy

The Texas House Committee on Delivery of Government Efficiency will gavel in at 9 a.m. Aug. 19 to hear invited and public testimony on the rollout of three laws it shepherded through the 89th Legislature — including the one that created the Texas Cyber Command — plus interim charges on using artificial intelligence to catch fraud, the effectiveness of the state’s data privacy law and oversight of three agencies under its jurisdiction.

Written comments can be submitted on any of the eight posted topics through the House comment portal until the hearing adjourns, per the hearing notice.

Chaired by Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, R–Southlake, the 13-member committee — eight Republicans and five Democrats, with Rep. Salman Bhojani, D–Euless, as vice chair — was created last session as the House’s answer to the federal Department of Government Efficiency, and meets in Room E2.012 of the Capitol Extension. Wednesday’s agenda is the panel’s broadest look yet at whether its signature 2025 bills are working as advertised.

The implementation charge covers House Bill 150, which established the Texas Cyber Command as the state’s centralized cybersecurity authority headquartered in San Antonio and transferred security functions from the Department of Information Resources — a handoff DIR says took effect under the new law. Members will also review House Bill 3963, which directed the state to build an early childhood integrated data system, and Senate Bill 14, the regulatory-reform law that overhauled agency rulemaking and ended judicial deference to agency interpretations of law.

A separate charge asks how the state can leverage technology, including AI, to detect fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer resources — territory adjacent to the committee’s oversight of DIR’s digital-government push, which The Texas Dispatch covered in July when the agency reported that more than half of Texans now use the “Texas by Texas” app for state services. State leaders have framed cybersecurity and AI capacity as a competitiveness issue, a case Sen. Tan Parker made in a Dispatch interview earlier this year.

The privacy charge examines whether the Texas Data Privacy and Security Act, enacted in 2023 as House Bill 4 and in force since July 2024, adequately protects Texas residents and businesses. Capriglione authored the law, and Attorney General Ken Paxton has made it an enforcement centerpiece — his office filed the first state-AG lawsuit under a comprehensive privacy statute against Allstate and its data subsidiary Arity, accusing them of collecting and selling driving data from millions of consumers without consent.

Finally, under its standing oversight authority in Section 301.014 of the Government Code, the committee will take testimony on the three agencies in its jurisdiction: DIR, the Sunset Advisory Commission and the Texas Space Commission.

Because this is an interim hearing, the committee will take no votes on legislation. Its findings will feed the interim report and any implementation fixes members propose to the 90th Legislature, which convenes in January 2027.

Meeting at a glance

Committee members

• Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, R–Southlake (HD-98) — Chair
• Rep. Salman Bhojani, D–Euless (HD-92) — Vice Chair
• Rep. Daniel Alders, R–Tyler (HD-6)
• Rep. Rhetta Andrews Bowers, D–Rowlett (HD-113)
• Rep. Briscoe Cain, R–Deer Park (HD-128)
• Rep. Liz Campos, D–San Antonio (HD-119)
• Rep. David Cook, R–Mansfield (HD-96)
• Rep. Pat Curry, R–Waco (HD-56)
• Rep. Linda Garcia, D–Mesquite (HD-107)
• Rep. Mike Olcott, R–Aledo (HD-60)
• Rep. Ana-María Rodríguez Ramos, D–Richardson (HD-102)
• Rep. Tony Tinderholt, R–Arlington (HD-94)
• Rep. Ellen Troxclair, R–Lakeway (HD-19)