House Panel Adds Right-to-Repair Amendment to 2027 Defense Bill Despite Past Contractor Opposition
@DailyCaller reported that Reps. Pat Harrigan and Maggie Goodlander introduced an amendment to the 2027 NDAA that would give the military rights to repair its own equipment. The measure passed the House Armed Services Committee by voice vote on June 4.
koreaherald.comRepublican North Carolina Rep. Pat Harrigan and Democratic New Hampshire Rep. S. military rights to repair its own equipment.
The House Armed Services Committee incorporated the amendment by voice vote during its markup on June 4. The measure still requires passage by the full House and Senate and the president’s signature before it can become law. Language providing the right to repair appeared in the 2026 NDAA but was removed from the final version after defense-industry opposition.
Project On Government Oversight has stated that the current lack of repair rights could be costing taxpayers tens of billions of dollars each year. William Hartung, senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said contractors control key data and can charge exorbitant prices for repair work.
Former Navy Secretary John Phelan testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on June 10, 2025, that sailors should be allowed to maintain their own equipment.
He described a visit to the USS Gerald R. Ford, where eight ovens serve 15,300 meals a day and only two were working. 7 billion in June 2024 for the F-35 program even though the fleet did not meet the minimum percentage of airworthy units, according to the Department of Defense Office of Inspector General.
Hartung said the F-35 repair software is controlled by Lockheed Martin and the aircraft is ready for combat a little over half the time. The Army was unable to obtain the data needed to maintain its Stryker armored fighting vehicles and therefore awarded a sole-source technical support contract to General Dynamics Land Systems worth about $534 million over five years, the Government Accountability Office reported.
The program had tried unsuccessfully to acquire unlimited data rights for the base vehicle.
U.S. Army Spokesperson Ellen Lovett said the service is identifying right-to-repair constraints in current contracts, establishing a central repository to track intellectual property, and updating internal policies. Rep.
