Self-Driving Cars Will Be Regulated by an Industry Insider
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is the US agency charged with overseeing automobile safety, including rapidly proliferating self-driving cars. The agency’s new head reportedly worked on Apple’s self-driving car project until recently.
Jonathan Morrison is another example of the revolving door in the Trump administration, which is already rife with appointees plucked from the industries they are now charged with overseeing. (Smith Collection / Gado / Getty Images)
As tech companies roll out self-driving cars in ever more locales, the federal agency deciding on the future of autonomous vehicles on the nation’s highways has a new top cop: a Silicon Valley attorney who reportedly worked on Apple’s top-secret self-driving car project, but who refuses to confirm or deny the allegations to the public.
President Donald Trump’s choice for the country’s highway czar has been allowed to keep his stock in Apple, according to federal ethics disclosures reviewed by the Lever. He’s also been tied to allegations of corporate meddling in road safety issues during the first Trump administration.
Last month, lawmakers confirmed Trump appointee Jonathan Morrison to helm the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Department of Transportation arm charged with overseeing automobile safety. Up until his nomination, Morrison was a lawyer at Apple, where he reportedly worked on so-called Project Titan, the tech giant’s secretive, and ultimately failed, self-driving car experiment.
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