As summer approaches, not only some congressmen hope that this will be the last time Americans “spring forward” their clocks. Public opinion polls show that most Americans do not like the biannual clock adjustments. While there is a divergence on whether to implement daylight saving time or standard time throughout the year, more Americans lean towards making daylight saving time permanent. However, many health experts believe that standard time is more beneficial for the human body.
Leaders of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have called for the abolishment of daylight saving time. In December of last year, President Trump expressed support for ending this “inconvenient” and “costly” practice. Although Trump did not clearly state his stance, legislators in many states this year have indicated their preferences.
Nearly twenty states have introduced legislation on daylight saving time. Some states, including Illinois and Ohio, have resolutions urging Congress to make daylight saving time permanent, with preparations already underway, and some states have passed such legislation.
Legislators in Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania are pushing for year-round daylight saving time. Mississippi also proposed a similar bill, which was rejected in committee.
States can only opt for year-round standard time (only two states have done so), they cannot choose to implement daylight saving time year-round. In most cases, the aforementioned bills will only allow states to implement daylight saving time permanently if permitted by Congress.
US Representative Celeste Maloy recently introduced a bill to allow states to observe daylight saving time year-round.
States such as Arkansas, California, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, and West Virginia have introduced bills to make standard time permanent or exempt states from observing daylight saving time.
Alaska, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia have put forward legislation supporting year-round daylight saving time and standard time in a competing manner.
Legislators in Texas have also proposed allowing voters to express their preference between permanent standard time and permanent daylight saving time.
Some proposed legislation comes with conditions. For example, the proposed bill in Oregon only allows regions in the Pacific Time Zone of the state to adopt permanent standard time year-round, provided that California and Washington make similar changes within the next ten years. The bill introduced in Connecticut would have the state observe daylight saving time year-round, contingent on Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York doing the same.
A bill in New York, if passed, would establish a task force to “study the impact of New York’s decision to opt out of daylight saving time.” In Oklahoma, a bill has been introduced to repeal a law signed last year that would have made the state observe daylight saving time permanently.
In many of these bills, legislators have clarified that if the US were to switch to year-round daylight saving time, their states would follow suit. Utah’s bill stipulates that if the federal government allows the state to observe daylight saving time year-round, then the state will switch to daylight saving time.
In California, a resolution has been passed declaring that the legislature acknowledges the health benefits of permanent standard time, with voters having approved the change to daylight saving time by a two-thirds majority. As this change can only be made based on federal law, the state can only switch to permanent standard time.
Many states have enacted similar legislation. Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Minnesota, Tennessee, and Wyoming have passed laws to implement daylight saving time permanently if Congress allows. Some states like Delaware and Wyoming have added provisions requiring neighboring or nearby states to do the same before locking their clocks.
Some states have not considered legislation on clock changes this year or recently. These include Michigan, New Hampshire, and New Mexico. In the past five years, the District of Columbia, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin have not introduced relevant proposals.
Meanwhile, new bills introduced in Congress have all been submitted for committee review.
Daylight saving time this year will begin on March 9th and end on November 2nd.