Tesla is preparing to deliver a stark warning to Washington: without urgent regulatory reform, the United States risks handing the future of transportation to China.
According to written testimony, Tesla will appear before the Senate Commerce Committee this week to push for modernized self-driving regulations, arguing that outdated rules are slowing innovation and deployment. The company plans to tell lawmakers that if the U.S. fails to take the lead in autonomous vehicle development, “China will be the dominant manufacturer of transportation for the 21st century,” as first reported by Investing.com.
The testimony comes at a pivotal moment for autonomous driving in the U.S., where companies are navigating a fragmented mix of federal guidance and state-by-state rules. Tesla’s message is expected to center on the need for a clearer, nationally consistent regulatory framework that allows self-driving technology to scale safely and quickly. From Tesla’s perspective, regulatory uncertainty isn’t just a policy headache — it’s a competitive disadvantage.
This push also lands shortly after Elon Musk made headlines with comments claiming Tesla has essentially “solved” full autonomy, suggesting the company’s system is now primarily waiting on regulatory approval rather than technical breakthroughs. Musk has also said Tesla’s current AI4 hardware is already capable of supporting unsupervised Full Self-Driving once the automaker puts it out.
Tesla isn’t speaking in hypotheticals either. The company has already begun offering publicly accessible, fully unmanned Robotaxi rides in Austin, using an unsupervised version of FSD with no driver or even safety monitor onboard. That real-world deployment gives Tesla fresh ammunition as it argues that U.S. regulations need to evolve from supervising experimental pilots to enabling broader commercial rollouts.
Meanwhile, China continues to aggressively back autonomous driving through coordinated national policies, large-scale testing zones, and faster paths to commercialization. Tesla is expected to point to that contrast as evidence that leadership in self-driving will define not just the auto industry, but AI, robotics, and logistics for decades to come.
Whether Congress heeds Tesla’s warning remains to be seen. But Tesla’s stance is clear: the race for autonomy is already underway, and regulation — not technology — may determine who wins.
