DOJ Supports ‘Right To Repair’ Class Action Against John Deere

U.S. consumer protection in general has had an ugly few decades. One bright spot however has been the shift in the “right to repair” movement from niche nerdy fare to the mainstream.

Not only have corporate efforts to monopolize repair resulted in a flood of proposed state and federal laws, the Biden Administration’s executive order on monopoly power and competition urged the FTC to tighten up its rules on repair monopolization efforts, whether it’s ham-fisted DRM, or making repair manuals, parts, and diagnostics hard to come by.

At the receiving end of much of the movement’s ire has been John Deere, whose draconian repair restrictions on agricultural equipment often result in customers having to pay an arm and a leg, or drive hundreds of additional, costly miles to get their tractors repaired.

Last week, the DOJ announced it had filed a “Statement of Interest” (pdf) in a class action lawsuit currently waddling through the Northern District of Illinois, alleging John Deere of illegally monopolizing the repair of its tractors. In it, the DOJ makes clear that “right to repair” is lodged squarely in the heart of the government’s painfully inconsistent interest in antitrust reform:

“Consistent with Supreme Court precedent, the policy of the United States is ‘to enforce the antitrust laws to combat the excessive concentration of industry, the abuses of market power, and the harmful effects of monopoly and monopsony—especially as these issues arise in . . . agricultural markets, . . . repair markets,’ and elsewhere too.”

Regardless, right to repair activists like U.S. PIRG say they appreciate the help:

We thank the DOJ for standing up for farmers and pointing out something that should be common-sense: We should be able to fix our stuff. Farmers rely on this equipment to grow our food, and make a living doing so. Selling farmers equipment and then refusing to allow them to access the materials necessary to keep it running is simply unacceptable. The facts continue to show that is the case, and so Right to Repair continues to move forward. This filing sends Deere a strong signal.

Granted not all is well in the right to repair movement. The federal effort to pass a new right to repair law appears stuck in neutral, and in states where a law has been passed — such as in New York State — lobbyists have shown how easy it was to get NY Governor Kathy Hochul to water down the legislation after it passed, rendering it little more than a performative victory.