WASHINGTON POST – After years of aggressively lobbying against “right to repair” legislation, iPhone maker Apple this week endorsed a measure requiring companies to give customers the tools to fix their products independently – a landmark reversal that follows years of mounting pressure from advocates, lawmakers and federal regulators.
Apple spokesman Nick Leahy said in a statement Wednesday that the tech giant “supports California’s Right to Repair Act,” SB 244, “so all Californians have even greater access to repairs while also protecting their safety, security, and privacy.”
Proponents of the campaign called it a massive and potentially game-changing shift by Apple, which has long resisted and lobbied against “right to repair” legislation.
California legislators for years have struggled to advance legislation on the issue amid consistent industry resistance. Apple’s reversal, proponents of the effort said, could clinch them legislative victory in California.
“Industry support should greatly help the bill’s chance of passing, and hopefully can be an effective template for other states,” said Electronic Frontier Foundation associate director Hayley Tsukayama, who previously worked at The Washington Post.
Nathan Proctor, a senior director at the consumer advocacy group US PIRG, called it a “huge step” that “likely puts the California bill, which already earned extensive support, over the top.”
“It is also a very significant show of force for the broader Right to Repair movement, which has been going head to head with Apple for a decade,” Proctor said in an email.
Gay Gordon-Byrne, executive director of the Repair Association, a coalition of advocacy groups that lobbies in favor of “right to repair” legislation, said the timing of the endorsement suggests Apple “realises they won’t be able to stop” the bill from advancing, and so “they are clearly trying to get out in front of another legislative defeat.”
In addition to growing threats from state legislators, the Biden administration has upped the pressure on tech companies to allow their customers to fix their products.
President Biden in July 2021 signed an executive order that urged the Federal Trade Commission to craft rules “barring unfair methods of competition,” including when cell phone manufacturers “impose restrictions on self and third-party repairs.”
The FTC shortly after voted unanimously to ramp up its enforcement against such restrictions, with Chair Lina Khan saying at the time that those limits “can significantly raise costs for consumers, stifle innovation, close off business opportunity for independent repair shops, create unnecessary electronic waste, delay timely repairs, and undermine resiliency.”
Facing the prospect of tougher federal enforcement, tech companies responded, with both Microsoft and Apple announcing plans to make it easier for customers to fix their products within a few months, marking another major victory for the “right to repair” movement.
Biden later touted the changes, saying, “What’s happened (is) a lot of these companies said, ‘You’re right. We’re going to voluntarily do it. You don’t have to order us to do it.’”
Even so, groups representing Apple have reportedly continued to lobby around “right to repair” legislation at the state level as officials pushed to enshrine such protections.
The effort has seemingly notched legislative victories since, leading to the passage of some state measures that “right to repair” proponents saw as weak.
Proctor said that while “Apple was able to negotiate changes to the bill” in California, he believes the proposal “remains strong.”
