It’s possible that we won’t have to remember to set the clocks back and forth two times a year going forward. An important vote could pave the way towards establishing year-round daylight saving time.
According to a report this week in The Washington Post, House Energy and Commerce Committee “is set to propose adopting the Sunshine Protection Act,” citing committee staff. It said that ending the clock changes is a priority for President Donald Trump.
Last January, U.S. Senators Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Rick Scott (R-Fla.) introduced the bipartisan legislation. This March, Scott announced that he would renew the push to make daylight saving time permanent.
“Even just an extra hour in the evening means more time to play with your kids, walk your dog, and, for those in the Sunshine State, enjoy all that our beautiful beaches, parks, and cities have to offer,” he said. “With support from President Donald Trump and a bipartisan group of colleagues, it’s clear that now is the time for Congress to pass my Sunshine Protection Act.”
Changing the clocks is a practice that Americans have observed for more than 100 years, but it became official as a legal requirement with the Uniform Time Act of 1966. Time zones and daylight saving time (DST) in the U.S. both have ties to transportation and the need to coordinate times for rail schedules, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. From November through March, the U.S. is on standard time rather than DST.
Daylight saving was also intended as a cost-saving measure and to provide an extra hour of sunlight at night during the spring and summer and an extra hour of light in the morning during the fall and winter months, per the Farmer’s Almanac. Since 2007, it has started at 2 a.m. at the second Sunday in March – pushing the clock forward to 3 a.m. – and ends at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday in November, pushing the clock back to 1 a.m.
Certain areas don’t observe daylight savings time. Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands don’t turn the clocks, as well as most of Arizona, with the exception of the Navajo Indian Reservation. Per the National Conference of State Legislatures, 19 states have also enacted legislation to provide for year-round daylight saving time, if Congress were to allow such a change. It said Congress would have to act before states could adopt changes.
In April 2025, Audacy reported that senators attended a hearing on daylight saving time titled “If I Could Turn Back Time: Should We Lock the Clock?”
At the meeting, Jay Karen, CEO of the National Golf Course Owners Association, advocated for permanent DST to allow more time for activities such as golf later in the day. Meanwhile, Dr. Karin Johnson, a practicing physician and professor of Neurology at UMass Chan School of Medicine Baystate (on behalf of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine), said permanent standard time would be a healthier option.
As Scott noted, Trump – who is an avid golfer and golf course owner – has said he would support doing away with changing the clocks.
Matthew VanHyfte, a spokesperson for the House Energy and Commerce Committee Republicans, told The Hill this week “that the panel plans to notice on Wednesday evening a full markup of the bill that will ‘list the legislation that includes the language from the Sunshine Protection Act,’” that would keep the country on daylight saving time year-round.”
Results from a poll of 1,006 U.S. adults conducted in 2025 by the Center for Public Opinion Research (CPOR) at Stetson University found that 75% said they supported an end to moving the clocks twice a year. Those results showed that 54% would prefer to keep DST all year. This year, a YouGov survey of 1,075 adult U.S. citizens found that two thirds of participants would like to eliminate changing the clocks twice a year and that more Americans would prefer to permanently spring forward and stay in DST all year.
