Trump Change Of Heart Or Musk Influence? President Once Said He'd Keep Autonomous Vehicles 'From Operating On American Roads'

There is renewed optimism for the autonomous driving sector, with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration updating regulations that could make testing and regulation easier.

The move comes after President Donald Trump previously opposed autonomous vehicles.

What Happened: The new Trump White House administration has taken steps to make autonomous driving regulation easier in the future.

The NHTSA announced it would allow exemptions to U.S. Auto Safety Standards.

U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy shared the updates in a video posted on social media Thursday.

Automakers will still be required to share crashes and data with the NHTSA, but redundancies have been eliminated, according to the report.

The update from the White House administration comes in stark contrast to previous plans announced by Trump.

On Oct. 10, 2024, Trump shared details on his plans for the automotive sector while speaking at the Detroit Economic Club. The president promised to put new restrictions on Chinese vehicles, have stricter rules on automotive trade rules with Mexico and Canada and increase tariffs on vehicles coming from other nations.

“It’s my goal to get our country on an automaking path that at some point in the near future it will be bigger and more important than it ever was,” Trump said.

Those comments resemble what is being done with tariffs and global trade. The update to the self-driving sector sounded significantly different from Trump's comments on the same day.

"Do you like autonomous? Does anybody like an autonomous vehicle? Know what that is? Right? When you see a car driving along? Some people do, I don't know. A little concerning to me, but the autonomous vehicles we're going to stop from operating on American roads,” Trump said.

The comments from Trump came hours before his friend and Tesla Inc TSLA CEO Elon Musk unveiled the Cybercab to the world for the first time at the company’s highly anticipated Robotaxi Day event.

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Why It's Important: Tesla and Musk have put a significant emphasis on self-driving vehicles being the future of the world and for the company's growth.

There has been concern in the past about the need for state-by-state approval of autonomous vehicles. The new NHTSA rules could make it easier for companies like Tesla to test self-driving vehicles in more cities and eventually get whole fleets on the road.

President Trump has a strong friendship with Musk since the billionaire endorsed him for president and donated to his campaign. This later evolved into Musk being the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

Trump has spoken out about electric vehicles before and still maintains some distance, but he bought a Tesla vehicle earlier this year to show public support for Musk and Tesla.

Musk's involvement with the government may have also benefitted the billionaire with more government deals for his companies and less oversight of the companies he runs.

Trump having a change of heart about self-driving vehicles or not stopping his administration from making things easier for the sector could indicate that he has become more informed on the matter, supports ending regulation, even if he’s not a fan of self-driving vehicles, or is doing so as a reward to Musk for his loyalty.

Investors and consumers may never get an honest answer as to why. Still, Thursday's news is far from the promise the president made six months ago to stop self-driving vehicles from operating on American roads.

The move may be similar to Trump’s change of heart about cryptocurrency and Bitcoin, as his pro-crypto stance gained support from voters in the 2024 election and he later launched his own meme coin.

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