The fix inches closer: Iowa moves farm right-to-repair bill forward
- Reference: 1771954958
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2026/02/24/iowa_right_to_repair_bill_farming/
- Source link:
Following an [1]18-5 vote in favor of the bill in the Iowa House Agriculture Committee last week, electronics repair outfit iFixit said "we think it's got a good chance of passing," while specifically calling out John Deere as one company that's trying to kill these kinds of bills.
The right-to-repair movement in the US has gained traction in recent years, particularly among farmers, who often operate on tight margins and rely heavily on complex, software-driven equipment.
[2]
Equipment manufacturers like John Deere have long limited access to proprietary diagnostic software, tools, and documentation, which critics say forces many farmers to rely on authorized dealers for certain repairs. That can increase costs and downtime compared to fixing equipment on site, since independent mechanics and owners often lack the same access to service materials and embedded software.
[3]
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The main issue is that independent repair shops rarely have access to the tools needed for diagnosing issues with manufacturers' proprietary software, and bills like Iowa's [5]HSB 751 aim to remove this kind of red tape.
When farmers have to send their equipment away for repair, it results in downtime, loss of productivity, and therefore vital revenue.
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Only Colorado has passed [7]right-to-repair legislation specifically for farming equipment, while other states have passed similar bills for electronic devices and powered wheelchairs. Several bills across the US currently in the works, including Iowa's, aim to achieve the same outcomes.
For Iowan farmers, such a change could have a significant positive impact on their operations.
The state is the second biggest agricultural producer in the US. Per the most recent [8]census data [PDF], Iowa has nearly 87,000 farms, responsible for 7.5 percent of the country's farming output, and around 83 percent of its total land is dedicated to farming. Only California [9]beats this , with its farmers responsible for 11.9 percent of the country's production.
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The non-profit Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) previously [11]said that broad right-to-repair legislation could save US farmers $4.2 billion per year.
Responding to the progress in Iowa, iFixit [12]said : "This bill has a good chance of making it all the way through. That's fantastic. If you buy a half-million-dollar machine, you should not need corporate permission to keep it running. Deere has made 'permission' part of the product.
"Iowa farmers are trying to unbundle that. And in 2026, it looks like Deere's usual tactics are running into a problem: they're not working like they used to."
John Deere's alleged foul play
Back in 2023, [13]John Deere signed a memorandum of understanding with the American Farm Bureau Federation, agreeing to provide independent repair shops with the tools they need to repair equipment.
All the company asked for in exchange was for the AFBF not to introduce or support right-to-repair legislation that went beyond the spirit of the MOU.
However, in October 2024, US Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to John May, CEO at John Deere, claiming that the company effectively reneged on the deal, providing repair shops with "impaired tools and inadequate disclosures," as PIRG put it.
[14]Congress quietly strips right-to-repair provisions from US military spending bill
[15]A lot of product makers snub Right to Repair laws
[16]Army and Navy have both asked for right to repair, now Senators want to give it to them
[17]The state of Right to Repair: Progress made, but key barriers remain
As The Register [18]reported at the time, the sense from the letter was that John Deere signed the MOU seemingly as a way to kill attempts to introduce right-to-repair laws and continue the status quo.
Senator Warren also suggested that John Deere might be violating the Clean Air Act by restricting the repair of emissions systems.
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is aware of the issue, and recently stated that the right to affordable repairs is imperative for US farming communities to thrive.
A February [19]response to John Deere's letter, sent to the EPA in June 2025, confirmed that temporary overrides of proprietary emission control systems are allowed under the Clean Air Act.
"EPA is proud to set the record straight and protect farmers. For far too long, manufacturers have wrongly used the Clean Air Act to monopolize the repair markets, hurting our farmers," said Lee Zeldin, administrator at the EPA.
"Common sense is following the law as it is written, and that is what the Trump EPA is committed to doing. By protecting every American's right to repair, we're not just fixing devices, we're securing a stronger, more independent future for our country."
The Register contacted John Deere for a response and will update this article if we hear back. ®
Get our [20]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.legis.iowa.gov/legislation/BillBook?ga=91&ba=HSB751
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aZ4tlHvsz1Yu8dTPhR2P7wAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aZ4tlHvsz1Yu8dTPhR2P7wAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aZ4tlHvsz1Yu8dTPhR2P7wAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://www.legis.iowa.gov/legislation/BillBook?ga=91&ba=HSB751
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aZ4tlHvsz1Yu8dTPhR2P7wAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/02/right_to_repair/
[8] https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/Highlights/2024/Census22_HL_FarmsFarmland.pdf
[9] https://data.ers.usda.gov/reports.aspx?ID=4058
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aZ4tlHvsz1Yu8dTPhR2P7wAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://pirg.org/resources/out-to-pasture/
[12] https://www.ifixit.com/News/115722/iowa-farmers-are-leading-the-fight-for-repair
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/07/john_deere_new_autonomous_tractors/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/09/us_military_right_to_repair_stripped/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/01/right_to_repair_laws_manufacturers/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/08/senators_military_right_to_repair/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/24/pirg_reports_progress/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/03/john_deere_repair_restrictions_warren/
[19] https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-advances-farmers-right-repair-their-own-equipment-saving-repair-costs-and
[20] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Can get the comparison out of my head...
China seems to work the other way around... "You bought it, you change it, we don't care"...
I started my solar stuff with one Growatt MIC 600, a string inverter, in a time nearly everyone pushed micro inverters. Which was very big luck, 'cause after I bought it I discovered (wrong wording: stumbled on it on the web) that this 600 Watt inverter is internally the same from 600 W to 2000 W, with many pictures on the web comparing the internals. So I "upgraded" it to 2000 W. And Growatt knows it since it is still connected to the Growatt Cloud, I see it on website and in the app "2kW", even though I manage it via RS485 (logging and export limitation control). I started with four panels, two parallel strings on east-west steep 50° roof.
About a year later I upgraded from four to "the max the co-owners would agree", effectively to five-fold the peak power from the solar panels, symmetrically on each side. And it works, hitting the 2 kW limit in the three summer month for 12 hours straight during a sunny day, and have enough in the three German-Winter month where the limit is never reached.
This December I "Turn brain off and click by on ebay" a second used Growatt MIC 600, so now east-west are not two strings in parallel, each are now connected to their own 2 kW on different phases. And it already pays out, I hit combined above 3000 W several times this February.
And Growatt knows it, and does not care. And in the end: It pays out for them, 'cause I did buy a second one... Such experience is also a way to market a brand in a positive way. Though I suppose they canceled the warranty bit for my two devices :D.
(And before anyone asks: Of course they have extra external fans, and they were needed even before the upgrade due to the position where they are mounted, temperature is watched and logged.)
Well, IBM at least did that for decades. You'd pay to upgrade to a bigger machine, and the CE would come in and change a jumper or load different firmware.
"That would break our business model so we demand it be made illegal."
Why not?
Agriculture is seasonal (whodda thunk) so trained service people get the most work during planting/harvesting/grooming. The rest of the time, it's shop stuff and perhaps, lots of time off. If JD sells diagnostic gear at reasonable prices and there are more service people, buying into the JD ecosystem is less of a risk. The last thing a farmer wants is to have a super expensive machine sitting dead in the middle of a field at a critical time. JD could still be getting the parts business if they stock parts and ship fast.
I heard one story where a GPS unit had gone out on a tractor and there was no replacement from JD. There were also no docs available for some independent shop to be able to make repairs. The reason was "proprietary information" in the design. A load of road apples. What JD did was cause the owner to look at purchasing a new tractor and likely not a JD given that they made their last one far less useful to somehow protect some claimed IP. The US government took on the role as enforcer with the DMCA legislation so nobody can make a business of reverse engineering/reproducing stuff that manufacturers have discontinued. I've made some good money doing that sort of thing. If Honeywell doesn't want to support some old kit, it's easy for me to make new cards to go in a building control system with updated parts or just build copies. High rise buildings tend to last for decades and stuff like fire control equipment can go out of support in 5-6 years.
If a piece of gear breaks and I can fix it or have it fixed at a good price, that's often more cost effective. If I'm blocked from repairing that item, there's a very good possibility that I'm going to buy something from a competitor and look to find one with docs and parts available. Way back when I worked on audio gear, lots of small PA rental companies had rigs built from second hand components. It was those repairable components that were often used so those were the brands that people would see the most. If the rental house uses TDM crossovers, they have lots of experience with gear and that's what they chose. Why should I, if I wasn't an expert, go with a different brand? If I always saw Biamp crossovers and they worked fine, I'd be more likely to buy those if I were in the market. Irreparable things will get binned or stuck on a shelf "for later" and aren't out in the world showing off their make/model.
Re: Why not?
stuff like fire control equipment can go out of support in 5-6 years
I owned a commercial building that housed a bar/restaurant I used to own as an investment. Because of its capacity it was required to have a fancy fire control system, which at time of installation used two analog phone lines (the second as a backup in case the first failed) That wasn't an issue since the business had two phone lines (main and fax) and we kept the fax line around even after the fax was gone to support it.
Then one day my insurance carrier informed me would after a certain date begin charging a sizeable premium to insure my building if it was still relying on analog phone lines instead of cellular, which rightly or wrongly they viewed as more reliable (whether that's because telcos weren't maintaining copper as well as they used to or because "analog" phone lines were increasingly sharing a single fiber part of the way from the central office to the customer I don't know)
So I looked into upgrading but unfortunately the panel was too old, the manufacturer said the only way to go to cellular was a new control panel at a cost of nearly $10K installed. Fortunately some googling told me there were third party companies that made a cellular attachment that pretended to be an analog phone line to fool the panel, and were insurance approved (which I confirmed with my carrier)
If that had been some type of proprietary connection instead of ordinary tip/ring phone line protocol that likely wouldn't have been possible. Still had to have the work done by a licensed installer even though it was very simple so it still ran me nearly a grand, but I made that money back avoiding that surcharge in less than a year.
Re: Why not?
>” So I looked into upgrading but unfortunately the panel was too old,”
Come across this a lot in the UK. Alarm system uses an analogue “red line”. Trouble is alarm system installed years (or decades back) so control panel may or may not support the adaptions necessary to support the switch to digital. Hence the Switch off of the POTS network in January 2027, in many cases also requires the upgrade of the alarm system…
The tricky part is that John Deere sells high-power and low-power machines — but they don't actually build low-power machines. They're high-power machines throttled with software. Kind of like HP would sell you expensive high capacity ink cartridges and cheaper low capacity ink cartridges, but the low capacity cartridges are actually high capacity cartridges that stop working before they're empty. Then they sue you if you manage to find a way to use the remaining ink.