Tesla Wanted Until November to Defend the Cybercab. NHTSA Had Other Plans

Tesla’s Robotaxi account marked Cybercab #67 joining the Austin fleet on September 21. Credit: Tesla Robotaxi/X

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has given Tesla until October 30 to deliver sworn answers on how it certified the Cybercab, its Austin robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals, a public NHTSA memo shows.

That is a month later than the original September 30 deadline, but well short of what Tesla wanted. According to the September 29 memo to file, Tesla asked on September 18 for an eight-week extension to November 20, citing “the voluminous nature of the request, and the need for Tesla to conduct a diligent search of records, review material for responsiveness and privilege, and organize and prepare information into thorough narrative formats in response to each question.” NHTSA granted 30 days on September 22.

The deadline belongs to a Special Order signed September 10 by NHTSA Chief Counsel Peter Simshauser, which escalated the agency’s Cybercab audit into a legally enforceable demand. Tesla’s response has to come with an affidavit from a responsible company officer swearing the answers are complete and correct.

Under federal law, automakers certify their own vehicles as meeting every applicable Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS), rather than getting approval upfront. NHTSA opened Audit Query AQ26002 on September 3, the day Tesla began commercial Cybercab service in Austin, to examine how Tesla reached that conclusion for a car that lacks a brake pedal, gas pedal, steering wheel and mirrors. The agency’s opening resume estimates the population at 1,000 vehicles, and we covered the probe when it surfaced.

The Special Order contains 21 requests, and many of them go straight at that driverless design. NHTSA wants Tesla to list every standard it certified to, explain which ones it decided do not apply, and say whether temporarily attached human driver controls were used to certify compliance before being removed. Other requests cover mirrors, turn signals that normally self-cancel with steering wheel rotation, and any touchscreen controls that let a passenger move the car.

The sharpest question involves brakes, because FMVSS No. 135 says “the service brakes shall be activated by means of a foot control,” and the order restates NHTSA’s view that a vehicle without one “could not certify” to that requirement. Tesla has to explain in detail how the Cybercab complies anyway. The final request goes further, asking how the car meets the standards at all without an exemption under Part 555, the process NHTSA uses to let a limited number of noncompliant vehicles on the road.

The memo does not say why NHTSA granted 30 days instead of eight weeks, and Tesla’s extension request itself is not in the public file, only the line NHTSA quoted from it. Tesla has not publicly said what its answers will contain, and NHTSA has not found that the Cybercab breaks any standard. The order warns that failing to respond fully or truthfully can bring civil penalties of up to $27,874 a day, capped at $139,356,994.

Nothing in the memo or the order pauses service, and Tesla kept growing the Austin fleet after the order landed. Its Robotaxi account posted on September 21 that Cybercab #67 had joined.

The new deadline lands nine days after Tesla’s third-quarter results, which the company said it will post after the market closes on October 21. Gold Cybercabs are also filling Tesla’s Dallas Robotaxi lot, where riders are still on Model Y.

That leaves Tesla three weeks to put in writing, under oath, how a car with no pedals passes a rule that requires one. Whatever it tells NHTSA by October 30 could matter more to where the Cybercab goes next than anything said on the earnings call.