How Right-to-Repair for the Pentagon Can Save You Money

Politicians on both sides of the aisle spend a lot of time campaigning on waste reduction in the federal government. If the goal really is to limit waste, we can look to the private sector for some suggestions. A consumer movement known as right-to-repair, if applied to the defense sector, has real potential to ensure taxpayers and service members are getting the best bang for their buck. 

Manufacturers often use different tactics to try to keep some control over their product, and to increase the period they can turn a profit from it, after a customer buys it. Their methods vary, but can include dictating which repair shops consumers can use to repair their products or withholding direct access to repair manuals.

Tech companies like Apple have long been criticized for trying to monopolize repairs on their products by requiring consumers to use manufacturer-certified repair services. And when you have a monopoly on repairs, you also get to decide when a product is beyond repair, even influencing consumers to opt for a new purchase altogether. 

What if I told you that the well-known out-of-order McDonald’s ice cream machines are also directly related to the right to repair? For a long time, McDonald’s wasn't allowed to repair their own equipment due to copyright protections for the machines’ software. 

The good news is, a contracting mechanism called right-to-repair has the potential to counter some of these tactics and put more power back into the hands of consumers — including the Department of Defense. 

Right-to-Repair and the Pentagon

Much like the manufacturers in the private sector, companies contracting with the Pentagon often limit the DOD’s right to repair its own equipment. Imagine you’re a service member. You have a mission to perform and must be able to immediately react to rapidly changing situations. But the equipment that’s vital to your mission malfunctions, and the manufacturer included a provision in the contract that prevents you from repairing that equipment. This is exactly what sailors aboard the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) have reported. They were told that much of the equipment on board was categorized as proprietary by the manufacturers, so they were not allowed to fix it themselves when it broke. LCS crews had no choice but to wait, sometimes for weeks, for contracting personnel to fly out to sea to fix the equipment. The manufacturers’ repair provision derailed the missions, left the sailors without functioning systems that in some cases were vital to crew safety, and took sailors away from their primary tasks because they had to escort the contractors throughout the vessel. To make matters worse, taxpayers have ended up footing the bill for companies to send personnel to the LCS for repairs ranging from a couple thousand dollars to over $1 million.

Unfortunately, this kind of thing happens all the time. The Air Force has struggled to access F-35 technical data they need to make repairs, soldiers have been prevented from repairing military vehicles due to warranty restrictions, and Marines have reported being reprimanded for fixing their own equipment. And the list goes on. 

Our service members are fully capable of repairing most military equipment and are well-versed in doing as much as they can with as few resources as possible. So why does the Pentagon take on additional, unnecessary risk and expense by agreeing to contract clauses that limit the right to repair? The fact that Pentagon contractors are keeping service members from fixing their own equipment is cause for concern from a waste perspective, overall safety perspective, and readiness perspective. 

• The Pentagon is wasting your taxpayer dollars when they allow contracting companies to have sole control over equipment upkeep and repair.
• Service members’ safety is put at risk when they can’t fix their own equipment or can’t get it repaired in a timely manner.
• Our military’s readiness is harmed when vital equipment is out of service for a day, much less for weeks at a time.

Right-to-Repair in Action

There have been some big wins in the consumer right-to-repair space. Apple has loosened some restrictions on self-repair and has even publicly backed right-to-repair legislation. And in 2024, an exemption was passed allowing McDonald’s to fix its ice cream machines. The right-to-repair potential is even greater when it comes to military equipment. The Pentagon has significantly more leverage than the average consumer: It is often the sole or largest buyer in military equipment contracts and has much more negotiation power than a consumer does in the civilian sector. 

You can get involved in the effort to expand right-to-repair to the Pentagon by sharing our fact sheet with your representatives in Congress. Let them know that the buying power is in the hands of the Defense Department and that it’s time they use it to reduce wasteful spending, increase safety, and improve military readiness by including right-to-repair provisions in acquisition contracts.