Senate PASSES bill to make daylight savings time permanent

The Senate has passed a bill to make daylight savings permanent from November 2023, and will now go to a vote in the House.

The new legislation called The Sunshine Protection Act means that Americans will stop having to change their clocks twice a year.

The bill was led by Democratic Sheldon Whitehouse and his Republican colleague Marco Rubio.

‘It’s time for Congress to take up our bipartisan legislation to make Daylight Saving Time permanent and brighten the coldest months with an extra hour of afternoon sun,’ Whitehouse wrote on Twitter.

The measure still needs approval from the House of Representatives and the backing of President Joe Biden. 

On Sunday, most of the United States resumed Daylight Savings Time, moving ahead one hour. The United States will resume standard time in November 2022.

Rubio said after input from airlines and broadcasters that supporters agreed that the change would not take place until November 2023.

Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands and most of Arizona do not observe daylight saving time. 

In November 2021, a poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds only 25 percent of Americans say they prefer to switch back and forth between standard and daylight saving time, when the sun rises and sets one hour later in the summer than it would during standard time.

Forty-three percent of Americans say they would like to see standard time used during the entire year.

Thirty-two percent say they would prefer that Daylight Saving time be used all year.

More to follow