General Motors Co, Alphabet Inc, Ford Motor Co and others have lobbied for the legislation to speed deployment of self-driving cars without human controls by allowing federal regulators to approve their use if they deem them safe and barring states from blocking autonomous vehicles. Current law prohibits vehicles without human controls. Two sources briefed on the matter said the bill would not include larger commercial trucks.

The House voted Wednesday to speed the introduction of self-driving cars by giving the federal government authority to exempt automakers from safety standards not applicable to the technology, and to permit deployment of up to 100,000 of the vehicles annually over the next several years. The bill was passed by a voice vote, and now goes to the Senate. State and local officials have raised concern that it limits their ability to protect the safety of their citizens by giving to the federal government sole authority to regulate the vehicles' design and performance. The House voted Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2017, to speed the introduction of self-driving cars by giving the federal government authority to exempt automakers from safety standards not applicable to the technology, and to permit deployment of up to 100,000 of the vehicles annually over the next several years. Members of the Senate Commerce committee are also working on self-driving car legislation, but a bill hasn't been introduced.

The bill, which was passed unanimously by a House panel in July, would allow automakers to obtain exemptions to deploy up to 25,000 vehicles without meeting existing auto safety standards in the first year, a cap that would rise to 100,000 vehicles annually over three years. Automakers and technology companies including General Motors Co and Alphabet Inc's' self-driving unit Waymo have been pushing for new federal rules making it easier to deploy self-driving technology. Meanwhile, some consumer groups have sought additional safeguards. The bill will be voted under fast-track rules that do not allow for amendments. A bipartisan group of U.S. senators has been working on similar legislation but has not introduced a bill.

Republican Senator John Thune, who chairs the Commerce Committee, Bill Nelson, the top Democrat on the panel, and Senator Gary Peters, a Michigan Democrat, said in a joint statement that existing federal vehicle regulations written over recent decades did not account for self-driving cars without a human driver behind the wheel.