President Donald Trump urged Congress in April to end time changes and “push hard for more daylight at the end of a day.” Lawmakers are now considering that proposal.
The U.S. House of Representatives will vote next week on a bill to make daylight saving time permanent, according to a notice posted Thursday.
In May, the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted 48-1 in favor of the Sunshine Protection Act. The federal bill, supported by Trump, aims to permanently end the semiannual changing of clocks and establish daylight saving time as the national standard.
While the U.S. Senate voted unanimously in March 2022 to make daylight saving time permanent, the measure stalled in the House due to opposition. The proposal the House will consider next week would allow states to opt out.
Daylight saving time — setting the clocks forward one hour during the summer half of the year — has been in place in nearly all of the United States since the 1960s. With the exception of Arizona and Hawaii, most states observe daylight saving time.
Springing one hour ahead, however, is “not good for brain health,” according to experts. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine, the American Medical Association and the National Sleep Foundation have all called for yearround standard time, which they say aligns the body with natural daylight.
Even though polls show most Americans dislike changing their clocks twice a year, the political moves necessary to change the system haven’t succeeded, as opinions on the issue and its potential impacts remain sharply divided.
Supporters of the Sunshine Protection Act say the time shift causes sleep disturbances, greater workplace injuries and more car crashes. They also believe brighter evenings would encourage more economic activity during winter.
President Donald Trump has pushed for an end to time changes, writing in an April TruthSocial post that staying on daylight saving time would be “Very popular and, most importantly, no more changing of the clocks, a big inconvenience and, for our government, A VERY COSTLY EVENT!!!”
Should the Act pass the House, it would face opposition from U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, and others.
Cotton has said the measure would result in “absurdly late” winter sunrises and force children to “walk to school in the pitch black” in much of the country.
Representative Vern Buchanan, a Florida Republican who has put forward the bill regularly since 2018, proposed it again this year. The plan is popular in the lawmaker’s home state because it would allow more evening hours to play on golf courses and sports fields.
Representative Frank Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat, said permanent daylight saving time would improve safety and boost the state’s tourism industry.
The United States used year-round daylight saving time during World War Two. It was reenacted by President Richard Nixon in 1974 to reduce energy use following the country’s oil crisis. But that stint proved unpopular and brief — it was repealed by Congress later that year.
Making daylight saving time permanent would mean the sun rises around 9 a.m. in Detroit for a while during the winter. Staying on standard time year round means the sun would be up at 4:11 a.m. in Seattle in June.
Jay Pea, president of Save Standard Time, an organization devoted to switching to standard time for good, weighed in on the longlasting time change debate, saying, “There’s no law we can pass to move the sun to our will.”
