Effort to hold Uber liable for driver sexual assaults heads to ballot
California’s trial attorneys and Uber — longtime courtroom foes — are officially bringing their fight to the November ballot.
A coalition of lawyers and advocates announced Thursday that it has gathered enough signatures to ask voters to support a “first in the nation” law that would make rideshare companies legally responsible for sexual assaults that happen to a driver or customer during a trip. Uber has argued it’s not liable for assaults committed by drivers, who are considered independent contractors.
“We must hold Uber accountable today,” said Danielle Tudahl, who recounted being sexually harassed and chased by an Uber driver after ordering a ride through the app, at a Sacramento news conference. “Californians are finally demanding action to try and close some of these gaps and put people’s safety over corporate profits.”
Uber has described the ballot measure, which is sponsored by the Consumer Attorneys of California, or CAOC, as retaliation for its own November ballot push to cap how much attorneys can earn in car crash cases in California.
“This ballot measure is a cynical ploy by billboard lawyers,” said Nathan Click, a spokesperson for A More Affordable California, an Uber-backed coalition. “CAOC didn’t spend millions to put this on the ballot to protect survivors — their goal is protecting billboard lawyer profits.”
The coalition that supports Uber announced last week it had gathered enough signatures for a measure that would cap attorney fees for car crash cases at 25%, among other changes.
Uber says its ballot measure will give victims a larger cut of their settlement money, rather than the payout getting siphoned off primarily to attorneys and doctors. Attorneys fire back that it will leave thousands of people with small or thorny cases without a lawyer because they won’t have financial incentive to sue.
Both sides are gearing up for an expensive fight. Uber has given more than $77 million. The Alliance Against Corporate Abuse, the CAOC-backed coalition pushing the sexual assault measure, has raised more than $68 million from law firms across the state, according to campaign finance records.
The money has helped pay for billboards that have sprouted across L.A. informing drivers that, according to the New York Times, Uber received a report of sexual assault or misconduct every eight minutes on average between 2017 and 2022. The company was the subject of a series of investigations by the paper into sexual assault by drivers. The company says it has invested billions in keeping riders safe and has “done more than any other company to confront” sexual violence.
The proposed sexual assault measure would require ride-share companies to let riders know if the person picking them up has a history of sexual misconduct and conduct yearly fingerprint and background checks for drivers.
The company is currently fighting more than 3,000 lawsuits from passengers who claim they were sexually assaulted or harassed by Uber drivers. Those cases are being coordinated by a federal judge in California.
The attorney coalition had also pushed an initiative aimed at nullifying Uber’s fee-capping measure if it passed. Alex Stack, a spokesperson for the campaign, said they were “pausing/withdrawing” the measure to “focus the fight on our sexual assault prevention measure and beating Uber’s initiative.”