Driverless Car Company’s Actions Don’t Match Its Rhetoric

(SAN FRANCISCO) – The following is a statement from Peter Finn, Teamsters Western Region International Vice President and Secretary-Treasurer of Teamsters Local 856, regarding a forthcoming report by law firm Quinn Emanuel on the General Motors (GM) autonomous vehicle (AV) subsidiary Cruise. Cruise hired Quinn Emanuel to conduct an internal investigation after the California Dept. of Motor Vehicles (DMV) revoked Cruise’s permits for allegedly lying to regulators about an incident where a woman was hospitalized after one of its robotaxis ran her over and dragged her for 20 feet.

“Mary Barra, GM’s Chief Executive Officer, is telling the public that Cruise wants to rebuild trust and focus on safety, transparency, and accountability. That means releasing the complete Quinn Emanuel report to the public once it’s finished and accepting penalties from regulators, neither of which the company has committed to doing right now.

“Furthermore, in addition to releasing the findings of the report, the company must offer a detailed accounting of what Quinn Emanuel investigated. This should include the company’s complete safety data, how and why Cruise hid the crash video and other key details from regulators (as alleged by the DMV), and why the company initially blamed first responders in public statements. The internal review should also account for potential factors that cause safety incidents at Cruise, such as internal processes for protecting whistleblowers, where accountability begins and ends at Cruise, how often GM’s board is given safety reports from Cruise, and the economic incentives for executives that could have caused safety incidents to occur.

“GM wants Cruise to be perceived as transparent and accountable without having to do the work of being transparent and accountable. Their unwillingness so far to release the report leaves questions about what else we don’t know. It’s also exemplary of a larger problem in the AV industry – these companies can pick and choose what safety data they share with the public without real oversight. That is why the Teamsters will continue to fight for real AV regulation, both in California and nationwide.”

Founded in 1949, Teamsters Local 856 represents over 17,000 hardworking members in the San Francisco Bay Area, North Bay, Sacramento, and Central Valley communities. For more information, go to Teamsters856.org.

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