TIA is working closely with Congressman Seth Moulton (D-MA) and Congressman John Katko (R-NY), two influential members of the House of Representatives who led the bipartisan effort to pass the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, as are now preparing to circulate a bipartisan letter urging the House and Senate leadership to support a fully funded Appropriation Bill by February 18.
TIA was one of the first transportation related organizations to be added to the letter.
The new congressional letter is in response to the January 24 letter that TIA and other organizations sent to Congress.
The new letter will be signed by:
The letter calls for full year funding for FY 2022 for the infrastructure bill. The recently passed bipartisan legislation authorizes $1.2 trillion over five years, a much-needed record amount for roads, bridges, metro trains, and safety programs. The continuing of current funding levels will leave a gap of approximately $90 billion a year.
TIA is actively contacting members of the House Ways and Means Committee, the House Committee on Appropriations, the Senate Finance Committee, and the Senate Committee on Appropriations urging them to tap other unused and available Federal funds to fill in the void rather than looking to the tire related industry to raise, reinstate past Federal excise taxes, or to impose new Federal Excise taxes. Since 2020, over 40 bills have been introduced to collect more from our industry through taxes.
TIA continues to oppose:
On February 3rd, U.S. Representative Bobby L. Rush (D-Ill.), a senior member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, introduced the Right to Equitable and Professional Auto Industry Repair (REPAIR) Act (H.R. 6570). This legislation would preserve consumer access to high quality, affordable vehicle repair by ensuring that vehicle owners and independent repair shops have equal access to repair and maintenance tools and data as car companies and licensed dealerships.
TIA supports the legislation.
Consumers prefer independent auto repair shops over licensed dealerships by a wide margin — 70% of the 288 million registered vehicles in the U.S. are maintained by independent repair facilities. However, inadequate and outdated laws and regulations have made it increasingly difficult for independent repair shops to access critical vehicle data needed for repairs, benefiting car companies and licensed dealerships at the expense of consumers and mom and pop repair shops.
"Americans should not be forced to bring their cars to more costly and inconvenient dealerships for repairs when independent auto repair shops are often cheaper and far more accessible," said Rep. Rush. “But as cars become more advanced, manufacturers are getting sole access to important vehicle data while independent repair shops are increasingly locked out. The status quo for auto repair is not tenable, and it is getting worse. If the monopoly on vehicle repair data continues, it would affect nearly 860,000 blue-collar workers and 274,000 service facilities.”
“The lack of meaningful consumer choice in the repair market harms low-income Americans and those in underserved communities most,” Rush continued. “A single mother who relies on her vehicle to go to work and get her kids to school can’t afford to wait days or weeks to have her car repaired at a dealership that is hours away and more expensive than the auto shop around the corner. That is why I am proud to be introducing the first federal Right to Repair legislation for the auto sector. The REPAIR Act is commonsense, necessary legislation that will end manufacturers’ monopoly on vehicle repair and maintenance and allow Americans the freedom to choose where to repair their vehicles.”
By way of a 2014 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), vehicle owners and technicians are supposed to have the same access to information, tools, and software that car companies make available to their franchised dealers. However, as cars become more technologically advanced, vehicle data is increasingly being transmitted wirelessly and sent only to vehicle manufacturers, who then have the ability to determine who can access the data and at what cost. Independent repair shops — which are cheaper than dealerships and preferred by the vast majority of car owners — are effectively locked out.
The resulting landscape has reduced choice and raised costs for consumers, who spend an average of 36 percent more on vehicle repair at dealerships than at independent repair shops. Limited access to data has already impacted repairs for 37% of vehicles in the U.S., and this number is set to increase dramatically in the coming years — by 2030, 95% of new vehicles sold around the world by 2030 will have wireless data transmission capabilities.
The REPAIR Act will update existing laws to reflect the modernization of automobiles and the importance of consumer choice in auto repair. The legislation is written to foster a competitive environment for vehicle repair while prioritizing cybersecurity and safety for vehicle systems.
Specifically, the REPAIR Act will:
In May 2021, the FTC released a report highlighting the barriers auto manufacturers have instituted to block consumers’ Right to Repair. In the report, the FTC supported expanding consumer repair options and found “scant evidence” for the repair restrictions imposed by original equipment manufacturers. In a subsequent policy statement on the report, the FTC noted that these repair restrictions create hardships for families and businesses and that the Commission was “concerned that this this burden is borne more heavily by underserved communities, including communities of color and lower-income Americans.” In July, President Biden issued an executive order encouraging the FTC to address anti-competitive repair restrictions.
The full text of the REPAIR Act is available HERE.
Right to Repair remains a top issue and priority for TIA.
By Chris Villani (Law360) -- An exasperated federal judge said he was close to a verdict in a suit challenging Massachusetts' revised "right to repair" law, yet he pressed attorneys for a group of manufacturers about why they didn't tell him that new Subaru and Kia vehicles complied with rules they claimed are impossible to follow.
After sitting through a bench trial last summer, U.S. District Judge Douglas P. Woodlock decided in October to hear new evidence about the cars in question, which can simply turn off the so-called telematics systems at the center of the law. The law broadens a 2012 version that gave independent repair shops access to cars' diagnostic and repair information.
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents big-name car brands like General Motors Co., Toyota Motor Corp. and Volkswagen AG, sued after Massachusetts voters passed the expanded law at the ballot box.
Judge Woodlock, describing himself as "irritated," pressed Alliance attorney John Nadolenco of Mayer Brown LLP on why the automakers didn't realize two of their members had taken steps to comply with the law before hearing the evidence and two sets of closing arguments.
"We will ask whether we are dealing with concerted ignorance, willful blindness, or simply 'don't ask, don't tell,'" Judge Woodlock said.
Nadolenco said the Alliance did not find out Subaru and Kia had disabled telematics systems on new cars being sold in Massachusetts until the fall, after the evidence had been presented to the judge.
But he also stressed that the evidence in question was not the smoking gun that the state attorney general, whose office is defending the law, has made it out to be.
"We simply didn't know during the case that Kia was doing what it was doing," Nadolenco said, adding there is nothing inconsistent about the proposed findings of fact that the carmakers submitted at the trial's conclusion.
"It was never disputed at trial that companies could turn off telematics — that was a truism from the get-go of the case," he said. "The new evidence is not new evidence; it was admitted to throughout the course of the case."
As the case sped to trial, both sides agreed to pick a subset of automakers to question during the discovery process, and Subaru and Kia were simply not part of that group, Nadolenco added.
"There is nothing nefarious there; they just weren't selected," he said.
Judge Woodlock said he was "trying to figure out why I should be as irritated as I am."
"Is it an ethical violation? I think probably not," the judge said. "Do I encounter it from time to time? Yes I do. Do I like it? No I don't."
The Massachusetts law broadens a 2012 version that gave independent repair shops access to cars' diagnostic and repair information. Attorney General Maura Healey's office has argued that turning off the telematics systems is a simple way for carmakers to comply with the law and not have to share any data.
Yet the Alliance has said switching the technology off is avoiding, not complying with, the law.
The automakers further claim giving independent auto mechanics access to a vehicle's telematics system — which tracks data such as location, speed, braking and vehicle diagnostic information — puts manufacturers at risk of violating federal safety standards by forcing them to either disable certain safety features or create a cybersecurity risk if the data falls into the wrong hands.
Judge Woodlock seemed skeptical of the latter argument during Wednesday's hearing, saying the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has not explicitly said the Massachusetts law would cause the carmakers to violate federal law.
"What we got was a Zen koan or perhaps the Oracle at Delphi telling us what the role of NHTSA would be, but we certainly didn't get someone saying 'this is a violation of federal law,'" the judge said.
"What you got was them saying they are concerned," Judge Woodlock said, adding dryly, "Aren't we all?"
The judge signaled that the case was nearing an end. He referenced the trial of the former chief of staff to a Massachusetts mayor convicted of corruption, a case that was slated to go to a jury in December but was pushed back to March when a government witness tested positive for COVID-19.
Judge Woodlock said he wanted to have the automakers' suit decided before the jury trial begins March 7, asking the attorney general to delay enforcing the law a bit longer until he reaches a verdict.
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation is represented by John Nadolenco, Andrew J. Pincus, Archis A. Parasharami, Eric A. White and Erika Z. Jones of Mayer Brown LLP, Elissa A. Flynn-Poppey, Laurence A. Schoen and Andrew Nathanson of Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo PC, and its own Charles H. Haake.
The attorney general is represented by Robert E. Toone, Eric A. Haskell, Phoebe Fischer-Groban and Julia Kobick of the Massachusetts Office of the Attorney General and by Special Assistant Attorney General Christine Fimognari.
The case is Alliance for Automotive Innovation v. Healey, case number 1:20-cv-12090, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.