By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON, July 13 (Reuters) – The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote this week on a bill to make daylight saving time year-round, while another group of lawmakers wants to make standard time permanent.
The House Rules Committee rejected a request on Monday to allow lawmakers to vote on the alternative proposal to make standard time permanent and voted to put the bill on the calendar for the week.
The bill could still fail on procedural grounds. Some Republicans want the House to take up a controversial voter ID bill championed by President Donald Trump and could vote against the procedural vote needed to open debate.
Representative Keith Self, a Republican, on Monday criticized the House for taking up the daylight saving bill.
“Pathetic. Republicans are majoring in the minors — fiddling with the clocks while the country burns,” Self said.
In May, the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted 48-1 in favor of the Sunshine Protection Act. The U.S. Senate voted unanimously in March 2022 to make daylight saving time permanent but the House never took up the measure in the face of opposition. The proposal would allow states to opt out. Hawaii and Arizona do not observe daylight saving time.
“Locking the clock all year long would have positive impacts on sleep schedules, energy conservation, motor vehicle safety, and our economy,” said Republican Representative Brett Guthrie, the chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee.
Supporters of the measure say the time shift causes sleep disturbances, greater workplace injuries and more car crashes. They also believe brighter evenings would spur more economic activity during winter.
Daylight saving time — putting the clocks forward one hour during the summer half of the year — has been in place in nearly all of the U.S. since the 1960s.
Last week, two lawmakers introduced the Sunshine for Our Kids Act , which would make standard time the permanent default nationwide, while allowing states to opt into daylight saving time if they choose.
Representatives Pat Harrigan and Mary Gay Scanlon argue that standard time helps ensure that mornings are better aligned with natural light and circadian rhythms.
Trump has aggressively pushed for an end to the twice-annual clock-switching.
If it passes the House, the Senate would need to again consider whether to take up the measure, which faces opposition from U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, and others.
Cotton has said it would result in absurdly late winter sunrises and force children to go to school in darkness in much of the country.
The U.S. used year-round daylight saving time during World War Two and enacted it again in 1974 to reduce energy use. But it proved deeply unpopular and Congress repealed it later that year.
(Reporting by David ShepardsonEditing by Nick Zieminski)
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