Push to end daylight saving time continues

Push to end daylight saving time

FOX 13's Kylie Jones reports.

TAMPA - The routine of changing the clocks twice a year has come into question again.

Lawmakers have discussed the practice of daylight saving time for several years, and debated whether to continue "springing forward" and "falling back", or eliminate it.

Recently, President-elect Donald Trump shared a post on "X", saying he would end daylight saving time.

"The Republican Party will use its best efforts to eliminate Daylight Saving Time, which has a small but strong constituency, but shouldn’t! Daylight Saving Time is inconvenient, and very costly to our nation, Trump wrote on "X".

Daylight saving time is the practice of springing forward an hour in the spring, which shifts daylight hours later in the evening.

In the fall, the clocks "fall back" an hour to standard time, which shifts daylight hours earlier into the morning.

There have been health-related arguments for both daylight saving time and standard time.

A lot of people want to do away with switching clocks twice a year, and want some sort of consistency.

Previously, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio sponsored the Sunshine Protection Act, to make daylight saving time permanent.

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"The reason why daylight saving makes sense is because you really can’t do outdoor activities, especially for kids and children in the community, because if parks don’t have lights, you’re shutdown by 4:30 or 5 o’clock in many parts of the country," Rubio said in 2022.

Rubio and other lawmakers in support of the legislation said this would have positive impacts on overall health and wellness, businesses and energy use.

The bill passed in the Senate, but got held up in the House of Representatives.

Some doctors and health experts have also called for ending the clock switches.

The American Medical Association pushed for permanent standard time. In 2022, the AMA supported ending daylight saving time and moving permanently to standard time.

Health experts say permanent daylight saving time would result in the sun rising after 8 a.m. for several months out of the year.

"We don't have more sunlight, we just have a shift in the timing of the sunlight," Cleveland Clinical Health Psychologist Dr. Alicia Roth previously said. "And, this could make a big difference on your circadian rhythm, your sleep-wake schedule."

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine has also previously supported replacing daylight saving time with permanent standard time.

"It is the position of the AASM that the United States should eliminate seasonal time changes in favor of permanent standard time, which aligns best with human circadian biology," the AASM said in 2023. "According to the statement, evidence supports the distinct benefits of standard time for health and safety, while also underscoring the potential harms that result from seasonal time changes to and from daylight saving time."

Arizona and Hawaii are the only states that currently don’t observe daylight saving time.

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