By Michael
After several weeks of researching the ongoing Uber sexual-assault litigation and proposed federal rideshare liability protections, I believe this is a conversation Congress cannot afford to get wrong.
Uber is facing a legal reckoning.
As of August 2026, more than 4,397 federal sexual-assault cases are active in the multidistrict litigation against Uber. These cases involve survivors who say they trusted a global brand to get them home safely — only to be assaulted or harassed by drivers they allege Uber failed to properly screen, monitor, or remove from its platform.
These are not simply numbers on a spreadsheet. Behind every case is a person who entered a vehicle expecting a ride and believing that the company whose logo appeared on the app had taken reasonable steps to protect them.
Now, while thousands of these cases are still being litigated, Congress is considering legislation that could make it significantly harder for passengers and survivors to hold rideshare companies accountable.
That legislation is the BUILD America 250 Act (H.R. 8870). A rideshare liability amendment adopted by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee would establish federal protections for transportation network companies such as Uber and Lyft, preempting certain state and local vicarious-liability theories for harm arising from an app-based driver's use of a vehicle. The amendment also addresses common-carrier and non-delegable-duty theories and includes exceptions for gross negligence and criminal wrongdoing.
Supporters of the proposal tell a different story.
Lyft argues that unnecessary litigation drives up insurance costs and, ultimately, fares for riders. The company supports the legislation as a national standard that it says would reduce costs while preserving safety requirements.
That argument deserves to be considered.
But it also raises a more important question:
What happens when the company itself had warning signs and failed to act?
That is where this debate becomes about more than insurance premiums or legal technicalities.
The Question of Corporate Responsibility
Recent Uber litigation has tested whether the company can be held responsible under legal doctrines that impose duties toward passengers.
Two federal bellwether trials have already taken place in the Uber sexual-assault MDL. In the first, a survivor was awarded $8.5 million. In the second, a jury awarded another survivor $5,000 and found Uber subject to common-carrier obligations in that case. Uber has indicated it will appeal the second verdict. Additional bellwether litigation is scheduled as the MDL continues.
Those cases do not establish a single nationwide rule that Uber is automatically liable for every action committed by a driver.
But they demonstrate why the current congressional debate matters.
The central question should not simply be
“Was the driver an independent contractor?”
The question should also be
“Did the company itself act reasonably to protect the passenger?”
If a company has the ability to establish screening requirements, conduct background checks, monitor drivers, respond to complaints, implement safety policies, and remove drivers from its platform, then the company's own decisions can matter when something goes terribly wrong.
That principle should not disappear simply because the person behind the wheel is classified as an independent contractor.
The Human Cost of Getting Liability Wrong
A passenger does not open the Uber app and think:
I am entering into a legal relationship with an individual independent contractor whose corporate platform has no responsibility for what happens to me.
They see the Uber logo.
They use Uber's app.
They trust Uber's screening process.
They rely on Uber's safety features.
And they expect Uber to take action when it receives credible warnings about dangerous drivers.
That expectation is not unreasonable.
It is the foundation of trust in the rideshare business.
And the concern is not limited to advocates or plaintiffs' attorneys.
In June, 128 members of the Democratic Women's Caucus and House Democratic Caucus urged House leadership to remove the rideshare liability provision from the BUILD America 250 Act. Their letter warned that the proposal could disproportionately harm women and girls and reduce legal recourse for survivors of sexual assault, crashes, and other incidents involving rideshare services.
A separate bipartisan congressional letter also urged House leadership to remove the provision, arguing that it could shield rideshare companies from liability when their own negligence contributes to crashes or sexual assaults.
This should not be reduced to a partisan argument.
Republicans, Democrats, rideshare companies, drivers, passengers, and survivors can disagree about insurance reform, litigation, and the proper limits of corporate liability.
But there should be one principle we can agree on:
When a company has the ability to prevent foreseeable harm, accountability should not disappear simply because the person who caused the immediate harm was classified as an independent contractor.
Accountability Should Follow Negligence
Congress should absolutely examine the cost of insurance.
It should examine frivolous lawsuits.
It should examine whether companies can be held liable for conduct they genuinely had no role in causing.
Those are legitimate questions.
But there is a critical difference between preventing companies from being held liable for conduct they could not reasonably have prevented and protecting companies when their own negligence may have contributed to someone's injury.
That distinction matters enormously to survivors.
Imagine a hypothetical situation in which a company receives credible warnings about a driver's dangerous conduct, fails to respond appropriately, and that driver later harms another passenger.
The important question should not be whether the company technically employed that driver.
The important question should be whether the company fulfilled its own responsibility to protect the people who relied on its platform.
If the answer is no, survivors should have the ability to prove that in court.
That is not corporate punishment.
That is accountability.
What Congress Should Do
The answer is not necessarily to make rideshare companies automatically liable for every crime or accident committed by a driver.
The answer is to preserve a passenger's ability to hold a company accountable when the company's own negligence contributed to the harm.
Congress should reject any provision that goes further than that.
A national standard should not become a national shield from responsibility.
Reducing insurance costs should not require eliminating legitimate legal claims.
And protecting businesses from automatic vicarious liability should not mean preventing survivors from proving that the corporation itself failed to act reasonably.
The goal should be simple:
Protect responsible companies from unfair liability while preserving justice for people harmed by corporate negligence.
That balance is possible.
Survivors Deserve Their Day in Court
Thousands of survivors are already navigating an extraordinarily difficult legal process.
Some are asking courts to determine whether Uber's policies, screening procedures, responses to complaints, and other corporate decisions contributed to the harm they experienced.
Those questions deserve to be answered through evidence and due process — not erased by legislation before the cases can be fully heard.
Congress should not close the courthouse doors on survivors who are already seeking justice.
Corporate convenience cannot outweigh public safety.
Lower costs cannot come at the expense of accountability.
And no company should be allowed to rewrite the rules of responsibility simply because the legal consequences have become inconvenient.
Congress should reject any liability shield that prevents survivors and injured passengers from holding rideshare companies accountable when the companies themselves were negligent.
Because when someone gets into an Uber, they are not simply buying a ride.
They are placing their safety in the hands of a company they trust.
That trust deserves protection.
Author's Note
I have spent the past several weeks researching the ongoing Uber sexual-assault litigation, rideshare safety policies, and the proposed federal liability protections currently being debated in Congress.
This article represents my perspective based on that research.
The purpose is not to argue that rideshare companies should automatically be responsible for every action committed by an individual driver.
It is to argue for something more basic:
When a corporation's own decisions or failures contribute to preventable harm, survivors should retain the right to seek accountability.
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