The “Right to Repair” Misnomer
Why DoD Doesn’t Need New Laws. It Needs Better Acquisition Execution
A $47,000 Black Hawk helicopter knob that could be made for $15. F-35 maintainers wasting 10 to 15 hours per week fighting a proprietary logistics system. Warfighters waiting weeks for contractor repairs they could perform themselves in hours.
These are not failures of legal authority. They are failures of contract administration.
I have been working on “right to repair” for the Army since Day One of this administration. Here is what the past year has made clear: we are solving the wrong problem.
The Term “Right to Repair” Does Not Belong Here
“Right to repair” is a term borrowed from a completely different context where it actually fit. It originated with farmers fighting John Deere’s software locks and warranty threats. When a farmer purchased a $500,000 tractor, John Deere claimed they did not actually own it, they had merely licensed the software that ran it. Farmers could not diagnose problems, could not repair their own equipment, and faced voided warranties if they tried. They had to wait weeks for authorized dealers while crops rotted in fields. The Federal Trade Commission filed suit in January 2025, alleging John Deere unlawfully withheld repair tools and inflated costs.
That is a genuine “right to repair” problem: a private party using intellectual property law to prevent owners from repairing what they purchased.
DoD’s situation is fundamentally different. The Government is not a private consumer. It is a sovereign entity with authorities that no farmer, no tractor owner, and no private corporation could ever possess.
The Legal Reality That Tends to Get Overlooked
The Government has had the legal authority to repair its equipment since 1910.
Under 28 U.S.C. § 1498, the Federal Government can use any patented invention it chooses. The only remedy available to the patent holder is a suit for monetary compensation. Unlike private parties governed by 35 U.S.C. § 271, who face injunctions and treble damages for patent infringement, the Government faces no such consequences. The patent holder gets paid. They cannot stop the Government from proceeding.
For non-commercial acquisitions under DFARS 252.227-7013, the Government obtains a license granting unlimited rights to all technical data necessary for form, fit, and function and for installation, operations, maintenance, and training. DoD also obtains licenses to share technical data necessary for emergency repairs. Similar provisions exist for commercial acquisitions under DFARS 252.227-7015.
The statement that DoD lacks a “right” to repair its equipment is not accurate. DoD has possessed that right for decades.
The only exceptions occur when DoD negotiates these rights away through specialty licenses or in Other Transaction Agreements under 10 U.S.C. § 4022 where DFARS clauses do not apply and contractors decline to agree. But even these situations result from choices made during contract formation, not from gaps in legal authority.
What DoD Actually Lacks Is the Ability to Repair
Here is the uncomfortable part that the legislative push does not address: DoD does not have a legal problem. It has an execution problem.
Even when contracts contain the appropriate license provisions, DoD routinely fails to identify the specific deliverables needed to effectuate repairs. This stems from program offices that are unwilling or unable to plan life cycle sustainment at the granular level required. They do not identify which hardware or software will need sustainment in five or ten years. They do not specify what technical data packages will be required. They do not list the necessary parts, materials, and tooling.
If you do not know what you need to repair your equipment, you cannot contract for it. No amount of legislation changes that planning failure.
Consider the F-35’s Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS). For nearly 20 years, this system plagued maintainers with thousands of documented deficiencies. In early 2019, then-Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson publicly described ALIS as “a proprietary system so frustrating to use, maintainers said they were wasting 10-15 hours a week fighting with it … and looking for ways to bypass it to try to make F-35s mission-capable.” In July 2021, GAO reported in that technical data issues negatively affected mission readiness for the F-35 program, finding that key engine repairs took longer than expected in part because the technical data available to maintenance providers was insufficient for the level of maintenance required. GAO expanded on these findings in November 2021 in its report on DoD’s approach to intellectual property.
But what tends to go unmentioned in the current reform conversation is this: the Government made a deliberate decision at contract formation to hand sustainment over to the contractor. As GAO Director Diana Maurer explained, “practically from day one, the government made a decision to hand sustainment nearly lock, stock and barrel over to the contractor, and that includes ALIS.” By the time the problems became acute, the contractor essentially owned the system, operated the system, and held the technical data because the Government structured it that way.
Maurer’s point is reinforced by the record from the November 2019, joint hearing of the House Armed Services Subcommittees on Readiness and Tactical Air and Land Forces, where she testified that “for too many years, sustainment has taken a back seat” and that “contractors largely own the technical data, provide the spare parts and manage the global logistics system.” GAO’s most recent assessment found that access to intellectual property and technical data remains “a long-standing issue negatively affecting the ability of maintainers to conduct maintenance on aircraft” and that F-35 squadrons deployed to forward locations lack access to certain data needed to independently take maintenance actions.
That was not a legal constraint. That was a contract drafting decision DoD could have avoided at any point over the last two decades.
The Real Problems Don’t Require New Legislation
To be clear: DoD’s current repair situation is unacceptable. Equipment sits broken. Warfighters wait for contractors. Costs compound. But the solution is using the tools already on the shelf.
Acquisition Planning Failures. Contractors structure their business models around repair income. That is expected. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll pointed to a Black Hawk screen-control knob: when it breaks, the original equipment manufacturer refuses to repair or replace it, forcing the Army to purchase an entire screen assembly for $47,000. The Army could make the knob for $15.
This is solvable through better source selection. Award contracts to vendors who offer broader data rights and more deliverables. Structure evaluations to reward sustainment planning. The old adage about proper planning is especially true for intellectual property, where the failures of 20 years ago during initial acquisition create today’s repair crises.
GAO’s September 2025 report examined data rights planning across five major weapon programs in sustainment – the F/A-18, F-35, Littoral Combat Ship, Stryker, and Virginia-class Submarine — and found that none of the selected programs with completed IP strategies included all of the elements required by DoD’s own policy. GAO recommended that Congress consider clarifying the treatment of detailed manufacturing or process data needed for operations, maintenance, installation, and training.
Exquisite Requirements Culture. DoD maintains a strong acquisition culture of buying only the most costly and complex solutions. This results in platforms like the B-52 and Minuteman III extending far beyond their planned service lives, requiring progressively more expensive repairs, the same way an old car demands more maintenance than a new one.
Adopting disposable approaches for certain systems, including unmanned aerial vehicles, or acquiring less capable but cheaper alternatives, enables more frequent replacement and reduces the repair burden altogether. No legislation required, just different requirements documents.
Workforce Capacity and Accountability. None of these problems stem from insufficient legal authority. They result from an acquisition workforce that is undertrained, overworked, and not systematically held accountable for ensuring proper data rights and deliverables in contracts.
The DoD acquisition workforce grew from 128,187 in 2006 to 185,864 in 2021, an increase of 57,677 people. Yet in May 2024, then-Army acquisition chief Doug Bush testified before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense that the contracting workforce had effectively “doubled their workload” managing COVID procurement followed immediately by Ukraine support, and that “perhaps some more people would be warranted.”
More troubling: 7% of civilian agency contracting officers are under 30, while more than four times as many are over 60. That is not a recipe for institutional knowledge transfer or sustained performance.
Why the Legislative Push Has Momentum
The bipartisan Warrior Right to Repair Act of 2025 (S. 2209), introduced by Senators Warren and Sheehy, would require contractors to provide “fair and reasonable” access to repair materials. The bill reflects genuine frustration: service members waiting for contractors, sustainment costs spiraling, and readiness degrading. That frustration is warranted.
But here is where the analysis has to be precise: contractors already must provide this access when DoD includes the standard DFARS clauses in contracts. The Army announced in May 2025 that it would include right-to-repair provisions in all new and existing contracts, something it could have done at any point under existing regulations.
The FY2026 NDAA ultimately did not include the reform provisions, despite broad bipartisan support in both chambers and backing from the administration. The final bill instead directed DoD, through Section 805, to build a digital system to inventory weapon-system technical data and track compliance with existing data deliverable requirements. Industry groups had argued that compelled IP disclosure would deter commercial and nontraditional contractors from participating in the defense market and that argument carried the day in conference.
Army Undersecretary Michael Obadal has since signaled that the renewed legislative effort for FY2027 will be “very narrow” scoped to specific unit counts, repetitions, and years before IP transfers trigger, with carve-outs for commercial software where DoD wants the contractor to maintain responsibility for updates and security patches.
That narrowing is sensible. The core point remains: DoD does not need to compel contractors to hand over intellectual property when DoD can negotiate for it upfront or proceed under the sovereign immunity protections it already possesses.
Two Areas Where Legislation Could Genuinely Help
I will not claim legislation is categorically unnecessary. There are two specific scenarios where Congressional action could address real gaps.
First: Some contractors absolutely refuse to negotiate licenses or deliverables at any price. This occurs most frequently in Other Transaction Agreements where IP rules are minimal. Congress could appropriate funding for DoD to purchase data deliverables, though costs would easily reach hundreds of billions. Alternatively, Congress could authorize some form of eminent domain for intellectual property under the Fifth Amendment, analogous to real property authorities under the Defense Production Act. Whether that is politically viable is a separate question.
Second: Contractors who agree to deliver repair items but refuse during performance. DoD currently lacks authority to compel specific performance; termination for default does not solve the underlying need. Congress could authorize DoD to seek injunctions compelling performance without termination. This would be slow and difficult, but it would address a genuine enforcement gap.
These are narrow, specific problems affecting a subset of contracts. They do not justify sweeping reforms applied uniformly across all DoD procurements where the existing authority is already sufficient for the vast majority of situations.
What the Solution Actually Looks Like
DoD could have addressed this problem at any point over the last 30 years by hiring and retaining sufficient acquisition professionals, training them properly in intellectual property and data rights, holding program offices accountable for life cycle sustainment planning, structuring source selections to reward data deliverables, using existing authorities instead of negotiating them away, and planning requirements that balance capability with sustainability.
These are not exciting solutions. They do not generate press releases. They require sustained investment in workforce capacity and accountability mechanisms that successive administrations have declined to prioritize.
It is easier to blame contractors and call for new legislation than to address decades of acquisition workforce underinvestment and accountability gaps. But the question remains: which would you prefer – another law that does not get enforced, or 10,000 trained acquisition professionals who know how to use the tools that are already available?