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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) hosted its Fall 2025 Safety Research Portfolio Public Meeting on November 20. See below the main topics discussed, which offer insights into the agency’s ongoing and future research initiatives aimed at improving roadway safety.

NHTSA’s Strategic Priorities

In his opening remarks, NHTSA Administrator Jonathan Morrison shared the agency’s current key priorities:

  • Increase technical engagement between the automotive industry and stakeholders.
  • Enhance the agency’s transparency and communication with an outward-facing approach.
  • Work to bring down the average age of vehicles (currently 13 years), by making cars more affordable.
  • Deter risky driving behaviors such as impaired and distracted driving.
  • Improve emergency post-crash responses.
  • Promote technological innovation—especially automated driving—while maintaining a focus on safety.

Continue Reading Report: NHTSA’s Fall 2025 Safety Research Portfolio Public Meeting

“There is nothing new in the realization that the Constitution sometimes insulates the criminality of a few in order to protect the privacy of us all.”

The late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia authored this line in his majority opinion for United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (2012), a case in which Justice Scalia—a contextualist who often argued that citizens have no Constitutional right to privacy—stated that attaching a GPS tracker to a vehicle was a violation of the Fourth Amendment and, indirectly a violation of the privacy of an ordinary citizen. In making this statement, Justice Scalia and the majority touched on an ongoing, rhetorical question at the intersection of transportation and the law that states are still grappling with thirteen years later: what rights to privacy do citizens have on public roadways?Continue Reading Big Data v. the Individual’s Right to Privacy on the Road

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Last Thursday, the Senate confirmed three of President Trump’s picks for Department of Transportation (DOT) administrator positions:

  • Jonathan Morrison, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
  • Sean McMaster, Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)
  • Paul Roberti, Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA)

The confirmations were considered “en bloc,” meaning that the administrators, along with 45 of President…

A recent Supreme Court petition in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II LLC et al. seeks to resolve a deepening circuit split over whether state-law negligence claims against freight brokers are preempted by the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA). While courts broadly agree that the FAAAA preempts state laws “relating to a price, route, or service of any motor carrier,” they diverge on whether the statute’s “safety exception” —which provides in relevant part that the FAAAA “shall not restrict the safety regulatory authority of a State with respect to motor vehicles”—permits claims for negligent hiring or selection against brokers.Continue Reading Supreme Court Asked to Resolve Circuit Split on Freight Broker Liability

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The European Commission has for the first time issued informal guidance under its revised 2022 Notice relating to “novel and unresolved” competition law questions. The two guidance letters, issued on July 9, 2025, both concern the transport sector. The first letter addresses a sustainability agreement aimed at reducing CO2 emissions in European ports by facilitating…

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In Kiekert de Mexico S.A. de CV v. Brose Jefferson, Inc., another federal court in Michigan relied on the 2023 Airboss ruling regarding “release-by-release” agreements in an order allowing an auto parts supplier in Mexico to reject order-by-order purchase releases from a Michigan purchaser, finding that the “needs” of the buyer under the parties’ agreement were too vague to meet the statute of frauds.

At the heart of this issue is what amount of specificity exactly is required to spell out a “requirements contract,” which is enforceable under the statute of frauds and cannot be terminated on an order-by-order basis. In the absence of sufficient specificity, a release-by-release agreement allows either party to walk away from the “blanket” or “umbrella” supply agreement except as to specific release orders that are issued and accepted.Continue Reading Another Michigan Auto Parts Agreement Terminated Under Release-By-Release Doctrine

On Thursday, the President signed three Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolutions that effectively prevent California from implementing its zero emission mandates for passenger vehicles and commercial trucks and its stricter emission standards for heavy-duty vehicles. Previously, the Government Accountability Office and the Senate Parliamentarian determined that the Biden Administration EPA’s approvals of these mandates were…

This week, the U.S. Senate voted to block California’s emissions standards for cars and trucks after taking a procedural vote that defied the Government Accountability Office and the Senate parliamentarian.

The party-line vote allowed Republicans to use the expedited procedures and simple-majority threshold, forgoing the filibuster, under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to override California’s Clean Air Act waivers from the Environmental Protection Agency.Continue Reading Congress Voted to Revoke California Waivers, Stalling EV Deployment Efforts

Autonomous heavy-duty motor vehicles — those with a gross weight of 10,001 pounds or greater — to date have been barred from public roadways in California. This will change if newly proposed California DMV regulations take effect.

The proposed regulations include several notable changes and perhaps most notable among them is the opportunity for providers of autonomous heavy-duty vehicles to apply for a permit to operate through testing or deployment.Continue Reading Autonomous Commercial Vehicles Now Come “Heavy-Duty” If New California DMV Law Passes