I can believe this is true. It's easier to make reliable AC switches because whatever arcing you get is self-extinguishing because the voltage passes zero 120 times a second. With DC, if you get an arc it'll just keep going as long as conditions allow. That means if you use a designed-for-AC switch in a DC application with the same voltage, it's likely to destroy itself sooner or later.

(Apparently this is one of the reasons why cars stick with 12V for accessories, because if they used higher voltages the electrical switches would be more expensive and less reliable.)

I don't know how this is normally overcome. In a lot of cases, the solution might just be "use a fuse instead".