Trump says he directed Republicans to eliminate 'very costly' Daylight Savings Time
By Geoff Earle
Daily Mail
Dec 13, 2024
'Daylight Saving Time is inconvenient, and very costly to our Nation,' President-elect Donald Trump posted Friday. A Republican bill for permanent daylight time passed the Senate unanimously in 2022
Donald Trump fired off a policy pronouncement from Mar-a-Lago Friday saying he would use his best efforts to 'eliminate' Daylight Savings Time.
Trump, who is assembling a cabinet and preparing to put in place campaign pledges on tax cuts, removing illegal aliens, and ending wars in Ukraine and Gaza, issued the statement in a post on his Truth Social sight.
'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.
His nominee for Secretary of State, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), has authored a bill that would provide for permanent daylight time. That effort could be popular in many urban areas in the winter months with short days.
The sun sets Friday at 4:29 pm in New York. Had the nation stayed on daylight time, it would set at 5:30. (The sun rises at 7:13 am there on the 14th. Daylight time would have it rise an hour later).
In West Palm Beach, the sun sets an hour later, at 5:29 pm without daylight time Thursday.
DailyMail.com has contacted the Trump transition to confirm his position.
Rubio's bill for permanent daylight time, called the Sunshine Protection Act, passed the Senate in 2022 by unanimous consent – meaning there were no objections, so going along with Trump's effort as described would be an extraordinary turnaround.
The idea of ending the biannual changes of the clock has the support of a powerful Trump advisor, SpaceX founder and the world's richest man Elon Musk.
'Looks like the people want to abolish the annoying time changes!,' he posted last month on X, his social media site.
That prompted an enthusiastic repost by Donald Trump, Jr., an avid sportsman who lives in Florida. ' leave it daylight savings time always' with emojis conveying 100% support.
Also chiming in was Musk's partner at the new Department of Government Efficiency Vivek Ramaswamy.
'It’s inefficient & easy to change,' Ramaswamy wrote.
Others have claimed daylight time contributes to sleep loss.
Billionaire Elon Musk, who has been a constant Trump companion since the eleciton, has called changes between standard and daylight time 'annoying'
Jumping online to support the president-elect was Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, who is set to lead the Senate Intelligence Committee.
But despite not objecting or not being present in 2022, Cotton backed up Trump.
'Congress once made Daylight Saving Time permanent. It was so unpopular that Congress repealed it less than a year later. The only sensible and durable way to stop the biannual time change is to make Standard Time permanent. I will work on this issue with @realDonaldTrump. w
'There are enormous health and economic benefits to making daylight saving time permanent,' said Florida Rep. Vern Buchanan in 2023. He said it reduced car crashes and reduced cardiac arrests.
He cited a Brookings Institution study that it reduced robberies, and a JP Morgan Chase study concluding there is a drop in economic activity when clocks move back.
He noted that the nation observed permanent daylight time in 1974-1975. That happened during the oil crisis. According to a New York Times account at the time it was repealed, 'parents became concerned about traffic accidents involving their children, who were going to school in the predawn darkness on winter mornings,' although a Transportation Department study didn't provide a clear picture on any increase.
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