Did Governor allow Uber to test self-driving cars in secret?

Did Governor Ducey allow Uber to test self-driving cars in secret? That's the charge in an article in UK-based The Guardian, but the Governor says that's not true, and his staff shared email messages to make his case.

This story received a lot of attention in the wake of the fatal accident earlier in March, where a self-driving Uber struck and killed a 49-year-old woman in Tempe. According to the article in The Guardian, Gov. Ducey urged Uber to roll out its experiment with self-driving cars in Arizona, and calls into question when those tests actually began.

In December 2016, Uber announced it was pulling its self-driving program out of California. The next day, FOX 10 Phoenix was there, when Uber's Volvo XC90 test cars rolled up to the Arizona State Capitol on a self-driving flat bed truck.

"I want to welcome Uber to Arizona. Very excited you are here, incredible new technology, a lot to be proven out," said Gov. Ducey at the time. "California may not want you. We want you to know Arizona does want Uber."

E-mails, however, show that Uber started testing self-driving cars in Arizona several months earlier. In an email from August 2016, an Uber employee writes to a staffer at the Governor's Office, saying:

Meaning Uber test cars driving by themselves, with human drivers as backup. The suggestion: Uber and Gov. Ducey kept the switch to self-driving a secret.

The Governor's Office, meanwhile, issued this response:

Uber's email went on to read:

The governor's office responded:

After the fatal crash, Gov. Ducey ordered Uber's self-driving cars off the streets in Arizona.