Guest commentary: U.S. needs autonomous vehicle legislation to compete with China

After decades of taking our innovation dominance for granted, American global leadership in technology is up for grabs from foreign competitors. Fortunately, policymakers have woken up to the alarm bells.

Last year, Congress passed the landmark CHIPS — Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors for America — and Science Act. This year, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has laid out a framework for artificial intelligence regulation.

The U.S. is at an inflection point as bipartisan leaders of the House Select Committee on China consider policies to combat challenges from our primary strategic competitor. These include discussions on how to position the U.S. as the world's leader on autonomous vehicles, technology that will increase road safety and fundamentally transform how people and goods move.

Effective autonomous vehicle policy means Congress must take a page out of previous legislative playbooks and focus on facilitating U.S. innovation while addressing national security concerns. This includes the security risks of Chinese AV companies operating on U.S. roads and the long-tail risk that would be posed by China's control of the global AV arena. America must respond with robust reforms that galvanize our homegrown AV industry and ensure we win the future.

Across the country, AVs are currently transporting passengers and goods, using advanced technology to navigate roads and making decisions without the need for human input. You can hail a self-driving taxi in Arizona, California, and Nevada, while autonomous trucks haul freight in states such as Texas and Arkansas.

The benefits of AVs are inspiring and life-changing. AVs don't speed or drive impaired or get distracted. Sadly, human drivers make all these errors on a regular basis, leading to nearly 43,000 deaths on American roads in 2022. Roadway deaths impose a heavy toll on our communities, and the trend lines are headed in the wrong direction. Autonomous vehicles can reverse those trends and significantly improve safety on the roads.

In addition, AVs will bring new mobility options to people who cannot drive, such as seniors and disabled people. They will ease the supply chain crisis and deliver important environmental benefits because smoother driving lowers emissions, and AV fleets can accelerate a societal shift to electric vehicles.

Despite the technology's obvious opportunities, the American AV industry is innovating with one hand tied behind its back because of the absence of a federal regulatory framework that promotes commercialization. This directly impedes continued investment by the private sector in the technology's development. That is in stark contrast with China, which has made AV development a top priority. To be clear, the U.S. should not back its AV companies in the same way the Chinese government has and must instead apply our American style of support for technology development. But now is the time for Congress and the U.S. Department of Transportation to take action on AVs and put in place policies that unlock the full benefits of the technology while maintaining America's competitive edge.

One area Congress should focus its attention on is the development of so-called novel design vehicles. Since humans are not driving the vehicle, companies are building vehicles different from traditional cars: shuttles with seats that face each other, delivery vehicles that don't have any people onboard and cars that simply don't need a steering wheel. Unfortunately, current regulatory hurdles are holding back domestic manufacturing and commercialization.

To usher in this new era of accessibility, Congress should lift vehicle exemption caps for AVs that have an equivalent or greater level of safety. This move would immediately unlock private sector capital while maintaining in place every safety and regulatory gate, allowing U.S. job creators to thrive at zero cost to the taxpayer.

Legislation should also include expanding eligibility for the test exception in the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act and modernizing the "make inoperative" provision. DOT should complete agency rulemakings that remove barriers to AV deployment and make consistent progress toward updating the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards to allow the AV industry to scale.

These are surgical steps that will send a strong message to the world that America is determined to be the global leader of the next great technological advancement. Without them, the American AV industry will struggle to take the next leap forward, where we reap the full benefits of increased safety, accessibility and supply chain resilience.

Autonomous vehicles are the future of transportation. The only question is whether the U.S. or China gets there first. I'm quite certain the U.S. can if policymakers recognize the urgent need to act at this critical moment.