05/29/2026
Who is next in line asking for corporate immunity? Uber.
For years, corporate lobbyists have pushed the same tired argument: if companies are held accountable when they hurt people, the economy will somehow collapse.
Now Uber is taking that message nationwide, and they want Congress to buy it.
Just last week, members of the U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee advanced a federal transportation bill that would give Uber and other rideshare companies sweeping protection from lawsuits involving sexual assault, wrongful death, and catastrophic crashes caused by drivers using their platforms. Because apparently the billion-dollar rideshare industry’s biggest problem is too much accountability.
This didn’t happen overnight. Uber has spent years trying to chip away at the rights of injured people and grieving families to hold the company accountable in court. In California and Nevada, multi-million dollar Uber-backed campaigns pushed ballot measures designed to make it harder for ordinary people to hire an attorney to take on powerful corporations. Uber executives were even reportedly rewarded with bonuses tied to “policy work that limits liability.”
But here’s the part they leave out of their massive lobbying campaigns: accountability is often the only thing that forces corporations to improve safety.
Consider background checks, driver screening, in-app safety tools, and policy changes. Those protections rarely happen because executives suddenly discover a conscience. They happen because juries, courts, and victims force companies to answer for preventable harm. If you take away accountability, and the incentive to protect people disappears right alongside it.
One California case highlighted by consumer advocates involved an Uber driver with multiple DUI convictions who allegedly killed two people while driving more than 100 mph. Despite those red flags, Uber still approved the driver through its rushed “background-check” system designed to maximize the number of drivers on the road while minimizing costs. And the safety concerns don’t stop there. According to the Alliance Against Corporate Abuse, Uber receives reports of sexual assault or misconduct involving rides approximately every eight minutes.
Instead of fixing failures like that, the company is lobbying Congress to make it harder for victims and families to seek justice.
Here in Iowa, we’ve already seen what happens when corporate lobbyists decide accountability is bad for business. We saw it when foreign pesticide manufacturers pushed for immunity after their products were linked to cancer. We saw it when politicians imposed government-mandated caps on cases involving death and catastrophic injury, limiting the ability of Iowa families to fully hold powerful interests accountable in court. Corporate immunity is not “reform.” It’s another get-out-of-jail-free card for companies that put profits ahead of people.
The Uber fight is still unfolding in Congress. And when the time comes, we’ll need Iowans ready to remind our elected officials that the Seventh Amendment belongs to the people, not mega-corporations.
