An Interview With Author Jerry Cox

Jerry Cox is not your bomb-thrower. He does not have the populist rage of Bernie Sanders, the theatrics of Michael Moore, or the cool-as-a-cumber doomsday warnings of Elizabeth Warren. Instead, he has years of experience—on Capitol Hill, in the corporate boardroom, and on the factory floor—as a smart, temperate, and connected operator who can work the labyrinthian halls of Congress and make things happen.

The seasoned Washingtonian worked with Missouri Senator John Danforth back in the 1980s to require installing airbags in passenger cars. More recently, after an alarming number of airbags manufactured by Takata Corporation exploded, the giant Japanese automotive component maker hired Cox to help manage the ensuing fallout: how would the public, markets, and auto giants deal with such a catastrophe in the making? The cushion-inflating devices Takata installed as lifesavers in more than a hundred million cars could go off like a hand grenade and hurl shrapnel at vehicle occupants, leading to deadly injuries. 

Cox, a battle-tested crisis control expert, recommended a sensical response: tell the truth, admit the mistake, and recall the airbags. Instead, the opposite happened. Tens of millions of vehicle owners have received safety recall notices. But fewer than half of the vehicles have been repaired.

Thirty million additional cars contain airbags with the same deadly defect, but the government has declined to recall them.

Cox tells the whole story in the gripping Killer Airbags that brings you right into the devil’s den, where financial considerations trumped public safety. The book is compelling, scary, and a wake-up call to car owners still on the road with a defective airbag that can end their lives.

Why did you write this book?
I considered it a moral obligation. Millions of people are at risk of losing their lives, and I am the only person willing and able to tell them the whole truth. Consumers expect that their government is protecting them from killer defects in cars. Even when Takata’s airbags started blowing up like hand grenades in the mid-2000s, federal regulators looked the other way. When Congress finally demanded action, the regulators signed off on a sweetheart deal that protected car companies—suppliers, car manufacturers, dealerships—and left consumers in the dark. A criminal prosecution resulted in payments of hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution to automakers and relatively nothing for people whose lives were lost or wrecked. A federal bankruptcy court took good care of Takata’s creditors and left a pittance to victims.

Who should read this book?
Anybody who owns or drives a car should be on the lookout for safety defects and demand immediate repairs from their dealers. The pandemic is forcing more Americans to take to the roads instead of the skies for their summer vacations. Before people head out, they should make sure they are not exposing themselves and their families to the hideous risks posed by defective airbags.

Tell us the essential take-aways?
There are three main takeaways for consumers. First, do not wait to receive a recall notice in the mail. Use Killer Airbags (see below) and other websites to determine whether there is a ticking time bomb in your steering wheel or dashboard. Second, never buy a car with a killer airbag or any other unrepaired safety defect. Third, do not expect to receive any compensation for injuries you might suffer. The system has been rigged to give personal injury and wrongful death claimants no more than six cents on the dollar.

Are you worried about retaliation?
The automakers are counting on millions of consumers not to show up and claim their free fix. If I could persuade those with a defective Takata airbag to take it straight to a dealer, it would cost car manufacturers billions of dollars. I fully expect they will attack me for that; perhaps in the same ways, they hounded Ralph Nader in the 1960s. That is one reason Killer Airbags includes a history of Detroit’s efforts to destroy Nader and hide the truth about safety defects that were designed into American cars from the earliest days of the industry. 

For more information on Jerry Cox and to order Killer Airbags, visit killerairbags.com.