By Mark Anderson

While there has been some appreciable progress in Congress to kill so-called “kill switches” and prevent these spy-like devices from being installed in new automobiles, it’s still anybody’s call what the ultimate outcome will be. Clearly, the issue needs more public awareness and associated action.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving is the main group lobbying for such switches, although MADD seems to overlook questions on whether the sensors used with kill switches might misinterpret driver behavior—swerving to miss a deer or a fallen tree—as drunk driving. 

Besides, the timing of switching off a vehicle would be critical and, if not done properly, could actually cause a serious accident rather than prevent one, critics point out.

Most recently, Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas), on June 3, aided by the House Freedom Caucus, put through an amendment to the 2027 THUD (Transportation, Housing and Urban Development) appropriations bill that substantially halts the kill switch. 

“Taxpayer dollars should not fund a surveillance system that treats every law-abiding American driver as a suspect. As we work to address very real problems, we cannot allow our Constitutional liberties to be shredded or create a world where every American driver becomes a node for data gathering,” Cloud was quoted as saying by several news sources.

Proving the adage that no person’s liberty or property is safe when Congress is in session, Congress passed the so-called Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act during the Biden administration in 2021. That bill contained the HALT Drunk Driving Act, which Biden signed into law on Nov. 15, 2021.

The HALT Act directs the National Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA) to write new rules that would require automakers to install anti-drunk driving technology within five years. It’s now been five years since Biden signed the bill into law.

The watchdog group Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom, while noting the Appropriations Committee passed the amendment 33 to 26, stated in a news release: “While this is the most progress we’ve made so far in halting this dangerous government spy system in every car, the Senate still needs to pass it. Also, an appropriations bill only lasts one year. This still doesn’t remove Section 24220 from statute, which is a MUST, long-term, to protect us from the kill switch.” 

Section 24220 directs the NHTSA to write a safety rule that requires new passenger vehicles to include built-in technology that somehow could “prevent” drunk driving.

TURF provided some recent history: “[Back] on April 27, Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) saw the chance to repeal the kill switch in the re-authorization of the FISA Act . . . . Roy tried to get it attached in the Rules Committee package on the FISA bill, but it was ultimately ruled as not germane to the main bill. However, we agree with Roy that warrantless searches of Americans using FISA is nearly identical to the government spying on every driver in their vehicle—both are in the name of security.”

While efforts to prohibit kill switches go as far back as 2023, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky), back on Jan. 22, 2026, tried to de-fund the kill switch in the 2026 THUD appropriations bill in the U.S. House. 

“It was another monumental vote on whether or not to keep funding remote kill-switch technology that allows the government to cut power to your car if it doesn’t like how you’re driving. Fifty-seven Republicans voted with Democrats to keep funding the Biden-era unconstitutional kill switch slated to start going into vehicles this year,” TURF noted, while stressing: “We’re headed in the wrong direction when even more Republicans are voting with Democrats to violate our constitutional rights to not spy on us without a warrant.”