Trump Presses Senate GOP to Pass Permanent Daylight Saving Time Bill

WASHINGTON —

President Donald Trump is turning up pressure on Senate Republicans to pass a House bill that would make daylight saving time permanent year round, but he is running into resistance from GOP senators worried about pitch-black winter mornings in their home states, The Hill reported.

In a Wednesday post on Truth Social, Trump said "people are sick and tired of having to change their clocks twice a year," arguing the twice-yearly switch "costs Millions of Dollars" and can be "bad for your health in the anxiety it creates," according to The Hill. He also claimed that ending the clock changes would help lower rates of robbery, murder and car accidents, and reduce the risk of stroke and seasonal depression, citing unspecified medical, crime and economic studies.

"This is an issue that Republicans, Dumocrats, and Independents can unite behind. I am asking Republican Senators to PASS THE SUNSHINE PROTECTION ACT, ASAP," Trump wrote, according to The Hill. It was the second such post in a week, The Hill reported, suggesting Trump has no plans to drop the issue.

A Regional Fight, Not a Partisan One

The House passed the Sunshine Protection Act a month ago by a bipartisan vote of 308 to 117, The Hill reported. The bill would end the twice-a-year clock changes that currently apply to every state except Arizona and Hawaii, locking clocks onto daylight saving time instead of standard time.

But Senate Republican aides told The Hill the bill lacks the support to pass by unanimous consent, and moving it through a floor vote would eat up at least a week of Senate floor time, at a moment when only a few weeks of the legislative session remain.

Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, the chamber's number three GOP leadership post, told