By Nathan Proctor
The U.S. military is the most powerful defense force in the world, but just like average Americans, service members can’t fix the equipment they rely on every day.
Right to repair is the simple idea that if you own it, you should be able to fix it. And right now, even the military doesn’t have the right to repair its own equipment and systems. All too often defense contractors block military personnel from accessing the tools, parts and information they need to repair equipment, resulting in escalating costs for the taxpayer, reduced readiness for the forces, and lives at risk for the men and women in uniform.
MILITARY RIGHT TO REPAIR SUPPORT GROWS
Over the past year, military Right to Repair has gained significant momentum. After the Army announced it would prioritize getting repair access as part of its ongoing procurement, bipartisan legislation was filed in the House and Senate to require Right to Repair access.
This proposal ended up incorporated into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the legislation which funds the U.S. military. Both the U.S. House and Senate passed versions of the NDAA with Right to Repair included. These provisions had strong support outside of Congress. The Trump administration, in addition to the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Air Force, have all expressed support for military Right to Repair.
A LAST-SECOND CHANGE
But major defense contractors are waging an intense lobbying push to strip these provisions from the bill and prevent the military from having the right to repair. We found out in December that Congressional leadership has removed bipartisan military Right to Repair provisions from the FY26 NDAA.
The change happened at the very end of the process, in the least accountable and open part of the negotiations, when just a handful of Congressional leaders hammered out the final text.
Just as Right to Repair for the military earned bipartisan support, removing it caused bipartisan outrage. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.) issued this joint statement:
“For decades, the Pentagon has relied on a broken acquisition system that is routinely defended by career bureaucrats and corporate interests … We support the Pentagon using the full extent of its existing authorities to insist on right to repair protections when it purchases equipment from contractors, and we will keep fighting for a common-sense, bipartisan law to address this unnecessary problem.”
As the statement indicates, while the NDAA language has been settled, Congress can still pass separate legislation to enshrine military Right to Repair, and it appears Sens. Warren and Sheehy will pursue this. The battle isn’t over.
to Repair.
