Groups Leading “Right to Repair” Movement Urge Biden Administration to Reject Any Attempts to Derail their Gains Via “Trade” Agreement as Latest Round of Indo-Pacific Trade Negotiations Start

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 12, 2023
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Consumer, Business, Farm, Digital Groups Leading “Right to Repair” Movement Urge Biden Administration to Reject Any Attempts to Derail their Gains Via “Trade” Agreement as Latest Round of Indo-Pacific Trade Negotiations Start

Washington, D.C. – In a letter sent today, a broad coalition urged the Biden administration to safeguard progress being made in states and nationally to give consumers and businesses a “right to repair” their electronics-enabled equipment and devices, by ensuring that a digital trade agreement being negotiated as part of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) does not include a special corporate secrecy shield that could block the right to repair. Signatories include American Economic Liberties Project, Center for Democracy & Technology, Consumer Reports, Farm Action, iFixit, National Farmers Union, The Repair Association, Public Knowledge, and U.S. PIRG.

The Biden administration’s battle against monopolies has spotlighted how consumers, farmers, and small businesses get abused by large manufacturers that unduly restrict access to necessary tools, parts, and information to repair their electronics-enabled equipment and devices. A burgeoning “Right to Repair” movement is making real progress at the state and federal level with five states passing legislation, and the Federal Trade Commission active in enforcing protections for users’ repair choice.

The broad coalition of consumer, business, farm, and digital groups united to raise the alarms about a rule that some in the tech industry are pushing for in the context of a major Biden trade agreement, the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. The little-known provision, officially called “source code,” was slipped into the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) in 2019 and could thwart the efforts of governments to require that manufacturers share essential information about their software, or even descriptions of algorithms. The way in which the term “algorithm” is defined in that provision could potentially be taken to mean any repair software, manual or other firmware update. The broad coalition of groups has sent a letter to President Biden urging the administration to exclude the damaging USMCA provision from the IPEF.

“People should be able to fix their stuff, and if a trade deal undercuts that, we should fix the trade deal,” said Nathan Proctor, U.S. PIRG’s Right to Repair Campaign Director. “The proposed language creates a massive loophole, undermining legislation cracking down manufacturers who refuse to provide what people need to fix their tablets, toasters and even tractors.”

“Repair.org is very concerned that including this trade language could destroy the rights of owners to control their property, remove constitutional powers granted to states, and replace it with control by dominant multinational companies, regardless of statute,” said Gay Gordon-Byrne, Executive Director of the Repair Association.

The administration has proposed a tight timeline for the IPEF, hoping to reach a final agreement by mid-November when the heads of state of the countries involved meet at a previously-scheduled Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco. The latest round of IPEF negotiations started this Sunday, September 10, in Thailand. The IPEF will set binding rules on countries representing 40% of the world economy.

“The right of consumers and businesses to choose where to get their digital devices repaired is a fundamental right of ownership. The authority of governments around the world to protect this right for their citizens should not be overridden by fine print in trade agreements negotiated in secret,” said George Slover, Senior Counsel for Competition Policy at the Center for Democracy & Technology.

“Big Tech’s so-called “digital trade” agenda has been exposed time and again as a threat to the democratic policymaking and the policies required to ensure that the digital economy works for everyone,” said Nidhi Hegde, Managing Director at the American Economic Liberties Project. “Our future cannot be determined in close-door trade negotiations, where members of Congress, civil society, and the general public have no voice. The Biden administration must immediately open up the negotiation process to public oversight and exclude any provisions that could preempt direly-needed right-to-repair reforms.”

"Most consumers who buy a smartphone or a scanner-printer would be surprised to learn that even if they wanted to, they are restricted in how and where they can get these devices repaired and save money and the environment. The right to repair something you own is a fundamental consumer right that we need to protect," said Sumit Sharma, Senior Researcher at Consumer Reports. 

“To keep their operations thriving, American farmers and ranchers must be able to repair their farm equipment as they see fit,” said Joe Maxwell, president of Farm Action Fund. “From Colorado to West Virginia to Washington, D.C., we have made strides in securing right to repair for agriculture. Yet, any language in future trade agreements that could limit policies requiring original equipment manufacturers to provide fair access to digital repair tools would cost America’s farmers and independent repair shops millions of dollars and further increase monopolization throughout the repair market.”

Read the full letter here. 

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