The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has formally demanded action from autonomous vehicle manufacturers after identifying what it called "a clear pattern of driverless AVs interfering with law enforcement and other first responders" in recent months. The agency's administrator, Jonathan Morrison, wrote a letter to developers stressing that emergency situations are not rare "edge cases" and urging companies to prioritise fixing the problem immediately. The intervention matters because it signals growing federal impatience with self-driving technology at a time when robotaxi services are expanding across US cities.

The concerns follow reports of autonomous vehicles obstructing ambulances and fire engines, including an incident in March when a Waymo vehicle blocked an ambulance responding to a deadly shooting at a bar in Austin, Texas, costing an officer several minutes to move it manually. According to Wired, first responder leaders told regulators in March that vehicles have been "backsliding", committing more traffic violations, freezing near fire stations, and failing to recognise responders' hand signals; officials in San Francisco and Austin, where Waymo operates, said the performance had worsened. Morrison noted that human drivers who impede emergency operations face fines and even jail time, and said the NHTSA will schedule meetings with AV makers by the end of July, giving them under a month to propose solutions.