Arizona's Governor Suspends Uber's Self-Driving Cars After Fatal Crash

More than a week after a self-driving Uber hit and killed a woman crossing the street in Tempe, Arizona, the company is facing the consequences. Today, on the orders of Arizona governor Doug Ducey, the Arizona Department of Transportation commanded Uber to suspend its testing of autonomous and highly automated vehicles on the state's roadways. It's an obvious setback for Uber's embattled self-driving program, which does much of its testing in Arizona, but the kibosh job also signals how local and state politicians elsewhere will be looking to control a new technology that comes with the promise of great safety and economic benefits--but also the potential to destroy jobs and, when it fails, to kill. And it's an unexpected blow from Ducey, who until the crash had championed the technology and encouraged companies like Uber to do their testing work in Arizona, where virtually no rules dictate what they can do where and when, and where they face no requirements to report or disclose anything about their programs, including crashes. In 2015, Ducey signed an executive order telling all state agencies to "undertake any necessary steps to support the testing and operation of self-driving cars."