Readers of Cato at Liberty knew all about this last July, and now the Obama Department of Transportation is confirming it publicly:

The Obama administration’s investigation into Toyota safety problems has found no electronic flaws to account for reports of sudden, unintentional acceleration and other safety problems. …
“We enlisted the best and brightest engineers to study Toyota’s electronics systems and the verdict is in. There is no electronic‐​based cause for unintended acceleration in Toyotas,” Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement.

If, as retiring NHTSA official George Person charged last July, DoT officials dragged their heels in making public the exculpatory findings, there were very real costs to the economy. Not only did lawsuits proliferate which one hopes are now on their way to sputtering out, but Toyota (as Reuters reports) “was the only major automaker in the United States to report a drop in sales last year” even though the Japanese‐​owned automaker has ramped up costly dealer and sales incentives. Did it make a difference that the federal government has taken a proprietor’s interest in major Toyota competitors GM and Chrysler, or that a former trial lawyer lobbyist heads the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration? Those questions might be worth a hearing at the newly reconstituted House Energy and Commerce Committee.