Lobbying, Corruption Stall Landmark NY Right To Repair Bill
Back in June New York state was the first state in the country to pass “right to repair” legislation taking direct aim at repair monopolies. The bill mandates that hardware manufacturers make diagnostic and repair information available to consumers and independent repair shops at “fair and reasonable terms.”
The final version of the bill enjoyed rare bipartisan support, passing the state assembly 147–2 and the senate 59–4. To make this happen, the bill doesn’t include vehicles, home appliances, farm equipment or medical devices — all sectors rife with obnoxious attempts to monopolize repair via DRM or by making diagnostics either expensive or impossible.
Activists had hoped to add such provisions later. But getting the bill as written into law has proven to be difficult. The bill has been parked for months without any movement on the desk of NY Governor Kathy Hochul. It seems likely that the bill will still pass, but lobbying has ensured that making that happen will apparently take as long as humanly possible:
The Digital Fair Repair Act, the first right-to-repair bill to entirely pass through a state legislature, is awaiting New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s signature. But lobbying by the nation’s largest technology interests seems to have kept the bill parked on her desk for months, where it could remain until it dies on Dec. 28.
“Right to repair” gained an incredible head of steam thanks to public annoyance at repair monopolies. Whether it’s John Deere’s restrictive crackdown on tractor repairs, or the annoying, life-risking monopolies enjoyed by many medical device manufacturers, anger on this front is sustained, bipartisan, and shows no sign of slowing down.
Companies eager to build repair monopolies have spent the last five years lying about how such laws will somehow make the public less safe. Meanwhile, lobbying ensured that New York’s landmark bill was as weak as possible, and it’s still somehow laboring to find its way across the finish line more than half a year after it was passed with broad bipartisan support. This is, as they say, why we can’t have nice things.
Filed Under: customers, drm, electronics, freedom to tinker, independent repair, kathy hochul, new york, repair monopolies, right to repair, self-repair
Comments on “Lobbying, Corruption Stall Landmark NY Right To Repair Bill”
GODDAMMIT!!!
*throws metal object across the room in frustration*
Re: Hey!!
Watch out for my tractor … it’ll cost me an arm and a leg and a kidney to get John Deere to fix it!
First, the link here goes to an online banking login page, not to some news article about the bill’s status WRT Governor Hochul.
Second, how does it work in New York? At the Federal level, the Constitution gives the President 10 days to veto or sign a bill and describes in detail what happens if the President takes neither action. Is there no equivalent time limit in New York?
Re: Inaction means it becomes law
I read about this, and it looks like it just becomes law if no action is taken by Hochul.
would have been nice if the justification section documented the justification of the differences between the original and amended version. HA!
and “would be inconsistent with or in violation of federal law” will just be interesting to watch.
yet again, thisshows who is running New York and indeed, the whole of the USA! corrption in the government being the main player!!
Hochul is just as bad as Cuomo, really. A huge chunk of the New York Democratic Party are a bunch of corrupt, incompetent idiots, they’re a big part of why the Democrats lost the House in the midterms. I wouldn’t be surprised if nonsense like this, along with Hochul’s other idiotic decisions, result in a primary challenge from a progressive challenger for the governorship and pressure from the national Democratic party to force the New York Dems to get their act together.