Jeff Farrah leads the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association, where he works across international, federal, state and local policy arenas. The issues range from Chinese competition to the practical challenge of getting autonomous vehicles on U.S. streets -- with states handling vehicle licensing while  the federal government focuses on design standards.

Our conversation centered on the need to build public trust in autonomous vehicles.

We also talked a lot about safety. Jeff said that autonomous vehicles are the safest on the road -- autonomous vehicles have logged 360 million miles, underscoring how much real-world experience the industry has accumulated.

On the personal side, Jeff is a Little League coach and big baseball fan.