Uber, Lyft hail Chao cabinet position
Uber and Lyft are hailing President-elect Donald Trump’s decision to nominate Elaine Chao for transportation secretary, viewing her as an experienced regulator who has publicly supported their labor model.
“We have the utmost respect for Elaine Chao, an accomplished public servant and highly capable leader,” Adrian Durbin, a spokesman for Lyft, wrote in an e-mail. “We congratulate her on the nomination and look forward to working with her on an array of transportation issues.”
Niki Christoff, head of federal affairs for Uber, said in an e-mail that “Chao’s knowledge of transportation issues is extensive and we look forward to working closely with her.”
Uber adviser Bradley Tusk called Chao a friendly appointment for the technology industry. “In many ways, she may be the Cabinet member with the most interesting and important tech policy issues out there,” he said, citing the department’s involvement in regulating autonomous vehicles to drones to the technology that decides how cars communicate with each other.
Chao, who served as labor secretary for eight years under President George W. Bush, has voiced support for companies in the sharing economy like Uber and Airbnb.
At a talk at the American Action Forum in November 2015, Chao said that “many of the government’s workplace regulations were created during an era when workers spent the majority of their lives in one establishment or one profession. That’s no longer the case today. So it is legitimate to ask if the regulatory solutions of the past — crafted by big government for big business — are appropriate for a peer-to-peer economy that is fluid, flexible and filled with workers who prefer independent arrangements. I believe there is room in our economy for a variety of approaches.”