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A provision to require automobiles built after 2026 to contain technology capable of limiting or preventing the vehicle’s operation will go into effect after Representative Thomas Massie’s move to block funding for the Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 for one year failed last week. Nineteen Republicans defied Massie and voted against his budget amendment, along with 210 Democrats, though two Dems — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez — voted Yes to Massie’s bill.
“Section 24220 of the [Infrastructure Act] mandates that by 2026, all new passenger vehicles shall be outfitted with ‘impaired driving prevention technology’ systems that passively monitor drivers’ performance, detect whether a driver is impaired and prevent or limit operation if the system detects impairment,” explains the Cowboy State Daily.
In an interview with the Washington Times earlier last week, Massie described the bill as “a train wreck.” On the House floor, he said:
It almost sounds like the domain of dystopian science fiction. That the federal government would put a kill switch in vehicles that would be the judge, the jury and the executioner on such a fundamental right as the right to travel freely.
Representative Harriet Hageman of Wyoming co-sponsored Massie’s amendment. She called the provision “a massive and likely unconstitutional rule and an invasion of privacy on a greater scale than we are used to seeing from our government.”
-Teresa Mull
On our radar
WHERE’S THEIR AIRTAG? A Secret Service agent charged with protecting the president’s granddaughter, Naomi Biden, discharged his weapon at a group of individuals attempting to break into a government vehicle in the Georgetown neighborhood of DC.
CLEAN SWEEP California governor Gavin Newsom admitted that San Francisco finally cleared its streets of homeless encampments, trash and human waste ahead of an APEC summit featuring a visit from Chinese president Xi Jinping: “I know folks say, ‘Oh, they’re just cleaning up this place because all these fancy leaders are coming into town.’ That’s true because it’s true.”
SPANBERGER STEPS IN Democratic congresswoman Abigail Spanberger announced Monday that she will be running to succeed Glenn Youngkin as governor of Virginia. Spanberger is the first to jump in the 2025 gubernatorial race, and the race to fill her open congressional seat will likely be very competitive.
Later, Tim
South Carolina senator Tim Scott dropped out of the GOP presidential primary on Sunday, leaving the field with seven remaining candidates, including frontrunner Donald Trump. Although he raised a lot of money, Scott failed to establish a national profile and separate himself from his opponents. After a lackluster first debate performance, Scott’s team intended to mount a more aggressive campaign, but those plans seemed to fail to materialize.
Scott managed to leave the race more popular among Republican voters than when he entered, but his staff may not agree. Sources told Politico that campaign staff found out their boss was dropping out from his exclusive interview on Fox News with Trey Gowdy, a fact that can be independently confirmed by The Spectator. Worse still, the Trump campaign got a heads up from Scott a few days before his interview, people familiar tell Cockburn.
–Cockburn
Haley’s hefty ad buy
Ambassador Nikki Haley has recently become a threat to Florida governor DeSantis’s second-place position in the GOP primary and is taking advantage of former vice president Mike Pence and Senator Tim Scott calling it quits. The Associated Press obtained documents that confirm that Haley’s presidential campaign will launch a massive ad buy, reserving $10 million in TV, radio and digital advertising in Iowa and New Hampshire.
The ads are set to begin in the first week of December. Haley’s purchases, according to AdImpact, are currently more than five times larger than the Florida governor’s. This ambitious move indicates that she is willing to invest big to challenge former president Donald Trump head-to-head. With the DeSantis campaign facing its own money problems and the remaining candidates underperforming in the polls, Haley’s team is about to risk it all to win it all.
–Juan P. Villasmil
From the site
Charles Lipson: In the Eric Adams case, the FBI’s leaks and bias persist
John Mac Ghlionn: Is California the new China?
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