Daylight Saving Time Bill Stalls in Senate as Trump Pressures Cotton
A House-passed bill to let states observe Daylight Saving Time year-round has hit a wall in the Senate, where regional divisions and a vow by Sen. Tom Cotton to block fast-track consideration have stalled the measure despite President Trump's public pressure campaign.
A push to end the twice-a-year ritual of changing clocks has run into a wall in the Senate, where a bill that easily passed the House this summer is now stalled amid regional divisions and a public clash between President Donald Trump and one of his top Senate allies.
The legislation, known as the Sunshine Protection Act, would allow states to voluntarily observe Daylight Saving Time year-round. It is popular with voters and has Trump's backing, but it has ground to a halt in the upper chamber, where Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., has vowed to block any attempt to fast-track it.
Over the weekend, Trump escalated the fight by sharing Cotton's personal phone number in a Truth Social post, urging Arkansas residents to pressure their senator to change his stance. «Almost everybody wants 'The Sunshine Protection Act' to pass, except for Tom Cotton,» Trump wrote. «To the Great People of Arkansas, please let your Senator know it would be a GREAT Bipartisan WIN for the United States Senate, and for America, itself.»
Cotton responded on X, noting that Congress has enacted permanent Daylight Saving Time before, only to repeal it once Americans experienced the consequences. «No one likes changing the clock, me included, but Congress has enacted permanent Daylight Saving Time multiple times before and repealed it each time once Americans experienced absurdly late sunrises in the winter,» Cotton said. «Arkansans don't want their kids going to school in the pitch dark, and I'll always put Arkansas first.»
In the 1970s, lawmakers did enact year-round Daylight Saving Time, but public opinion soured rapidly, particularly among parents whose children had to wait for school buses in darkness. The change was repealed about a year later.
According to a source, Cotton made a similar case during a recent closed-door weekly policy lunch when asked about the issue by a fellow Republican. No one in the room pushed back.
The debate over Daylight Saving Time is less partisan than geographical, pitting mountainous and Western states against coastal states. Sens. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and Patty Murray, D-Wash., introduced the Senate version of the bill last year. Murray said at the time that «every year, more Americans grow more frustrated setting their clocks back and forth,» and that residents of her state despair at losing an hour of sunlight when forced off Daylight Saving Time.
But lawmakers from landlocked Western states, including Sens. Steve Daines, R-Mont., and Mike Rounds, R-S.D., warn that permanent Daylight Saving Time would mean children going to school in the dark. «I can see where Florida likes it for tee times at certain times of the year, but it doesn't work so well for moms and dads putting kids on buses when the sunrise in Western Montana wouldn't be till 9:30 in the morning,» Daines told CNN in July. «It's not going to work for us.»
Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, R-Wyo., acknowledged in July that the vote is not a simple yes-or-no proposition for lawmakers. «Depends where you're living in the country and the impact — what it would be, in your own home state,» he said. «So it's not as simple as what one state might like.»
Even with its popularity, the bill faces a crowded Senate calendar. When lawmakers return after the midterm elections in November, floor time will be scarce, with the National Defense Authorization Act, supplemental war funding and a looming government funding battle expected to take precedence.
The standoff leaves the Sunshine Protection Act in limbo, with supporters pressing for action and opponents warning that the consequences of permanent Daylight Saving Time would quickly become unpopular once Americans experience them again.
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