After the driver of a Tesla vehicle crashed into a house in Texas on Friday night, killing a 76-year-old woman who was inside, several media outlets were accused of misleading readers and sensationalizing the story.
Initial coverage from some mainstream outlets, including the The New York Times (Lean Left) reported that the driver was in autopilot mode — however, days later, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and one of the company's AI leaders disputed this.
Tesla Driver Using Autopilot Crashes Into Home, Killing a Woman, Officials Say, read the New York Times headline.
A Tesla on Autopilot Allegedly Killed a 76-Year-Old Woman Inside Her Texas Home, read Gadget Review (Not Rated).
Other outlets shared the same angle:
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Tesla CEO Elon Musk and VP of Autopilot/AI Software Ashok Elluswamy pushed back against the headlines on X, with the latter writing, “In this case, the driver manually overrode self-driving by pressing the accelerator all the way to 100% of the accel pedal in this residential area. They reached a speed of 73 mph during the crash, and had the accelerator pressed even after the crash.”
Many media outlets AllSides reviewed didn’t update initial headlines or include this information.
The claim that the car was in autopilot mode appears to have initially come from the driver himself when he spoke to police. Multiple outlets reported some version of this.The New York Post (Lean Right) wrote, “The driver, 44-year-old Michael Butler, told investigators that the vehicle’s automated driving-assistance feature was engaged at the time of the crash…”
Headlines treated the driver’s claim as fact, rather than including both sides or waiting for third-party verification. The outlets may have been working with what information they had available at the time — a statement from police, as Musk and Elluswamy’s comments didn’t surface until a day later — but it shows how initial headlines can potentially mislead.
Business Insider (Lean Left) was criticized on X for the headline, “A Tesla driver using auto assistance crashed into a Texas home, killing a woman.” The publication later changed its headline to “Federal regulators open probe into fatal Tesla crash,” and included an editor’s note that said the story was “updated to reflect that the driver told authorities the automated driving-assistance feature was engaged at the time of the crash.”
Similarly, The New York Times’ article on the federal investigation led with the disputed information as if it were fact:
“The main federal auto safety agency said on Monday that it was investigating a Tesla crash that killed a woman in Katy, Texas, near Houston, on Friday night.
The driver was using Tesla’s automated driver-assistance system when his Model 3 left the road “at a high rate of speed” and struck a home, local officials said.”
Reading coverage from just one outlet on this story may obscure the tension at the core of the incident: the competing claims and sources of information (the police/driver, versus Tesla). And while some media outlets may have an incentive to villainize powerful corporations like Tesla by highlighting stories that cast them as irresponsible or corrupt, powerful corporations simultaneously have an incentive to make themselves appear faultless.
When reading the news, be sure to get a broad view, think critically about information sources, and compare coverage from a diverse group of outlets to avoid being manipulated and misled by any of the parties involved.
Julie Mastrine is the Director of Communications and Bias Services at AllSides; she has a Lean Right bias.
This piece was edited and reviewed by Henry A. Brechter, Editor-in-chief (Center), Andy Gorel, Managing Editor (Center), and Emily Allen, News Editor (Left).
