The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is charged with establishing safety and fuel economy standards for motor vehicles and promoting overall highway traffic safety.
In the second Donald Trump Administration, NHTSA may roll back the Biden Administration's actions on fuel economy and revisit the standing general order requiring self-reporting of crash data for vehicles equipped with advanced driving technologies. The agency is expected to lead public policy discussions on autonomous vehicles and other advanced vehicle technologies, seek to remove regulatory barriers to the deployment of highly automated driving systems and reevaluate recent regulatory actions taken by the Biden Administration. An anticipated new dynamic in the upcoming administration will be ongoing public scrutiny of NHTSA's actions in light of the role of Elon Musk in the Trump Administration.
As with other surface transportation agencies, NHTSA's dedicated funding will expire on Sept. 30, 2026. The next Congress will reconsider NHTSA's roles, resources and authorities, including in the areas of highly automated vehicles and recent safety trends such as increased crashes involving bicycles and pedestrians.
Background
NHTSA is the federal agency charged with regulating motor vehicle safety and researching and promoting highway safety. Its areas of focus are:
- Vehicle Safety. NHTSA oversees recalls of unsafe motor vehicle equipment, investigates and initiates enforcement actions related to vehicle safety, establishes minimum Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS), establishes fuel economy requirements in tandem with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) greenhouse gas emissions standards and provides consumers vehicle safety ratings.
- Highway Traffic Safety. NHTSA maintains nationwide statistics on highway traffic deaths and injuries, researches and develops data-backed safety countermeasures, provides grants to states, informs the public on safe driving (e.g., "Click It or Ticket") and works with various stakeholders to advance public safety on the roads.
Looking Ahead
Many of NHTSA's core functions likely will continue as usual in a second Trump Administration, including, for example, investigations of serious vehicle safety defects, distribution of state grants pursuant to statutory formulas and criteria, and safety campaigns to warn the public of hazards.
Other functions, however, will change with the political winds. These include the hotly contested fuel economy and related EPA tailpipe emission standards, which have gone back and forth under the first Trump and Biden administrations, as well as the agency's approach to emerging vehicle safety technologies including automated driving systems (ADS).
Fuel Economy
The first Trump Administration finalized a joint NHTSA-EPA fuel economy and tailpipe emissions rule in March 2020, after revoking California's waiver under the Clean Air Act – effectively preempting California from setting different standards for itself and other states. The Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicles Rule established model year (MY) 2021 to 2026 standards for passenger cars and light trucks, with increased stringency of 1.5 percent each year.
The Biden Administration finalized its own rules for EPA tailpipe emission standards in December 2021, covering MYs 2023 to 2026, and again in March 2024, covering MYs 2027 to 2032, for passenger cars, light-duty trucks and medium-duty vehicles. Greenhouse gas emission reductions between MYs 2027 and 2032 were estimated to be nearly 50 percent for passenger cars and light-duty trucks. NHTSA's related fuel economy standards were finalized in June 2024, covering MYs 2027 to 2031 passenger vehicles and light-duty trucks and MYs 2030 to 2035 heavy-duty trucks.
In the waning days of the Biden Administration, EPA finalized two preemption waivers for California to implement the Advanced Clean Cars II (ACC II) regulations for light-duty vehicles and heavy-duty highway and off-road vehicles. The waivers allow California to set tailpipe emissions standards for itself and other adopting states, which are different from federal law, as contemplated in the Clean Air Act. Of note, ACC II requires that by 2035, all new vehicles sold in California and other adopting states, must be zero-emission – effectively an electric vehicle (EV) mandate.
The incoming Congress and Trump Administration are expected to try to revoke the California waivers and possibly dilute the Biden Administration's emissions and fuel economy standards for MYs 2027 to 2031, to the extent such standards are not viewed as achievable by industry.
Relatedly, although not in NHTSA's jurisdiction, the Republican-controlled Congress may attempt to revoke the EV tax credits for both new and used vehicles, which currently are available through 2032.
Advanced and Emerging Vehicle Technologies
The Trump Administration is expected to be active and enthusiastic in facilitating the ongoing testing and deployment of autonomous vehicles and advanced vehicle technologies. NHTSA and the larger U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) leadership will be visible leaders in the field, convening stakeholders, producing policy documents, and embracing industry collaborations and announcements of new technologies and investments to further road safety.
If the first Trump term was any indication, NHTSA also will undertake numerous regulatory efforts to remove barriers to innovation. New leadership may be eager to expand testing exemptions and grant additional permissions for nonconforming vehicles and motor vehicle equipment, if doing so will further safety and innovation.
The new administration is expected to take a more cooperative approach with industry whenever possible as it relates to advanced safety technologies. NHTSA likely will revisit the standing general order requiring self-reporting of certain crash data for Advanced Driving Systems (ADS) and certain Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS). New leadership may prefer relying instead on voluntary information-sharing, as the prior Trump Administration began in the Automated Vehicle Transparency and Engagement for Safe Testing (AV TEST) Initiative.
NHTSA also may revisit a recent rule to require enhanced Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) standards, which automakers have described as unrealistic and disruptive of consumers' driving behavior. The Trump Administration may conclude that industry's voluntary adoption of AEB since 2016 has been very successful in advancing traffic safety and that the 2024 rule is not justified.
The Biden Administration published online the much-anticipated AV STEP proposed rulemaking on Dec. 20, 2024, with public comments due on March 17, 2025. It proposes a voluntary program to "streamline" processing of certain ADS exemptions. It contains very detailed application and reporting requirements, revealing the types of information NHTSA would like to have when evaluating exemptions and overseeing the safety of ADS operations.
Incoming NHTSA and DOT leadership will evaluate the AV STEP proposal, along with potentially significant public comments, before determining how the Trump Administration wants to proceed. Congress also will rely on this public discourse when considering what changes are needed to NHTSA's legal authorities, for the agency to keep up with advances in autonomous vehicles.
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