Lawmakers defend driver monitoring mandate for ‘public safety’

Congressional lawmakers Tuesday voted down an amendment by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) challenging a driver monitoring mandate which will require automakers to include “kill switches” in cars sold after 2026.

The mandate was voted into law in 2021 as part of the Biden administration’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Buried within the 1,039-page bill is a directive requiring the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to develop rules for driver monitoring technology. Vehicles will sense whether a driver is drunk or “impaired” in which case the vehicle will not operate.

“To ensure the prevention of alcohol-impaired driving fatalities, advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology must be standard equipment in all new passenger motor vehicles,” reads Section 24220.

While the bill cites drunk driving statistics to justify the law, it emphasizes several times that the mandate would also apply to drivers who are “impaired.” The term is not defined.

In addition to monitoring a driver’s blood alcohol content, the bill requires vehicles to “passively monitor the performance of a driver of a motor vehicle to accurately identify whether that driver may be impaired; and prevent or limit motor vehicle operation if an impairment is detected.”

Nor does the legislation provide clues as to how the technology might work. That is to be decided by the NHTSA by next year, and automakers will then have two years to implement the systems in all new vehicles.

“It’s so incredible that I have to offer this amendment,” Rep. Massie said on the House floor Tuesday. “It almost sounds like the domain of science fiction, dystopian science fiction, that the federal government would put a kill switch in vehicles that would be the judge, the jury, and the executioner on such a fundamental right as the right to travel freely.”

But opponents of the amendment offered their rebuttals, which included Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) flatly denying that the mandate requires anything other than monitoring.

“The amendment . . . does not require auto manufacturers to install kill switches. It does not do that,” Schulz said, which prompted Rep. Massie to later read the law verbatim on the House floor. Schultz also claimed the purpose of the mandate is to “save lives” and protect “public safety” while dismissing Rep. Massie’s argument for personal liberty.

“You don’t have a right to engage in potentially fatal behavior that we know poses a major health threat to public safety,” she said. 

Massie’s amendment failed in a 229-201 vote.

While Massie and many others are questioning the nature of the technology being mandated, automakers have already begun the process of integrating such systems.

In April, Volvo announced an investment in CorrActions, an Israeli startup developing technology that can detect a driver’s cognitive state. Through sensors built into the steering wheel and driver’s seat, the system will monitor a driver’s micromovements. An AI algorithm will then translate those muscle movements and detect whether the driver is intoxicated, tired, distracted or anxious.

CorrActions CEO Ilan Reingold says the driver monitoring system can determine a driver’s cognitive state with 90% accuracy and zero false positives.

In addition to concerns about how this might perform under a mandate, questions arise about whether authorities or insurance companies will demand such data in the event of a collision. If a driver is determined to have been tired or distracted — which could include holding a coffee, smoking a cigarette or adjusting a car setting — it could potentially sway the outcome of an insurance dispute or police investigation.

Neither Volvo nor CorrActions, however, responded to Frontline News about whether there have been discussions about submitting driver data to authorities.