We are just a few weeks away from the start of daylight saving time, and it is not just federal lawmakers (or President Donald Trump) who hope this is the last time we “spring forward.”
There is growing interest in discontinuing the practice. Polls show that Americans prefer permanent daylight saving time, although many health experts disagree.
In December, Trump backed the “inconvenient” and “costly” practice as DOGE leaders called for its abolition.
While Trump has not stated which side of the clock he is on, lawmakers in several states have expressed their preference this year.
Daylight saving time legislation has been introduced in nearly two dozen states.
In some states, including Illinois and Ohio, lawmakers have introduced resolutions urging Congress to make daylight saving time permanent, which is already being considered. Several states have already passed similar legislation, but more on that in a moment.
Lawmakers in Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania want to keep daylight saving time year-round. A similar bill was introduced in Mississippi, but it died in committee.
States can only request to use standard time all year (only two have done so), not year-round daylight saving time. In most cases, the aforementioned bills would permanently switch the state to daylight saving time only if Congress approved it.
U.S. Representative Celeste Maloy (R-UT) recently introduced legislation that would give states the authority to observe daylight saving time all year.
Several states, including 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 the state from observing daylight savings time.
Competing bills supporting year-round daylight saving time and standard time have been introduced in Alaska, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia.
Lawmakers in Texas have also proposed allowing voters to choose between permanent standard time and permanent daylight saving time.
Some of the proposed legislation includes caveats. In Oregon, for example, a proposed bill would put only the portion of the state that falls within the Pacific Time Zone on permanent standard time year-round if California and Washington agreed to do so within the next decade.
Connecticut’s proposed bill would only implement year-round daylight saving time if Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York followed suit.
If passed, a New York bill would create a task force “to study the effects of New York state opting out of daylight saving time.” A bill has been introduced in Oklahoma to repeal a bill signed last year that would have permanently implemented daylight saving time in the state.
Many of these bills clarify that if the United States switches to year-round daylight saving time, so will their respective states. According to the Utah bill, if the federal government allows the state to observe daylight saving time all year, it will switch to that practice.
In California, where a resolution “proclaiming that the Legislature acknowledges the health benefits of permanent standard time” has been introduced, voters have already given lawmakers permission to change the state’s daylight saving time period by a two-thirds vote. Because the change can only occur in accordance with federal law, the state could only transition to permanent standard time.
Several states have passed similar legislation. Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Minnesota, Tennessee, and Wyoming have all signed legislation to make daylight saving time permanent, if Congress allows it. Some, such as Delaware and Wyoming, included provisions requiring neighboring or nearby states to do the same before their clocks are locked.
Some states have not considered clock-locking legislation, either this year or in recent history. This includes Michigan, New Hampshire, and New Mexico. In the past five years, no related proposals have been introduced in the District of Columbia, Rhode Island, or Wisconsin.
In the meantime, all newly introduced congressional bills have been referred to committees. That means that daylight saving time will start on March 9 and end on November 2.
