Obama officials step up pressure on Toyota

Obama officials step up pressure on Toyota

The Obama administration has increased the pressure on the Toyota Motor Corp. Last Wednesday, the administration addressed a range of safety issues as investors and consumers reacted to the deepening crisis for the world's largest automaker.

In another potential knock on the company’s reputation for quality, Toyota said dealers in both the United States and Japan had reported complaints about the brakes in its new model Prius hybrid. Toyota said late Wednesday it has received 77 complaints in Japan over Prius brake problems.

Toyota pulled eight of its most popular models including the Camry, Corrola and Rav4 from U.S. showrooms in the last week of January after it launched a recall for problems with sticky accelerator pedals made by supplier CTS Corp.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has said it will investigate whether Toyota's electronic throttle control system could be part of the problem behind reported instances of uncontrolled acceleration in its vehicles.

Toyota has stated that it has found no other evidence of any safety problems beyond the two past recalls for accelerator pedals that can become stuck and the risk that a loose floormat can trap an accelerator pedal on some models, including the Prius.

The automaker has recalled 8.1 million vehicles for both sets of problems around the world, including 5.5 million in the United States.

Toyota's 1,200 U.S. dealerships have begun to receive shipments of parts needed to fix faulty accelerators and many said they would hire new crews and stay open late to fix recalled cars as quickly as possible over the coming weeks.

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