- Arrest made after video seemingly shows shooting and killing of man on a downtown St. Louis sidewalk in broad daylight CNN
- St. Louis suspect seen calmly loading gun, shooting homeless man execution style in broad daylight: police Fox News
- Video shows gunman nonchalantly shooting homeless man execution-style in broad daylight in St. Louis New York Post
- Suspect charged in fatal shooting in downtown St. Louis St. Louis Post-Dispatch
- Man Arrested in Brazen Sidewalk Killing in St. Louis That Was Captured on Video The New York Times
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Tag Archives: Daylight
Clock runs out on efforts to make daylight saving time permanent
A bill to permanently “spring forward” has been stalled in Congress for more than seven months, as lawmakers trade jabs over whether the Senate should have passed the legislation at all. House officials say they’ve been deluged by voters with split opinions and warnings from sleep specialists who insist that adopting permanent standard time instead would be healthier, and congressional leaders admit they just don’t know what to do.
“We haven’t been able to find consensus in the House on this yet,” Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) said in a statement to The Washington Post. “There are a broad variety of opinions about whether to keep the status quo, to move to a permanent time, and if so, what time that should be.”
Pallone, who chairs the House Energy and Commerce committee that oversees time-change policies, also said he’s wary of repeating Congress’ previous attempt to institute year-round daylight saving time nearly 50 years ago, which was quickly repealed amid widespread reports that darker winter mornings led to more car accidents and drearier moods.
“We don’t want to make a hasty change and then have it reversed several years later after public opinion turns against it — which is exactly what happened in the early 1970s,” Pallone said.
With lawmakers having hit the snooze button, there is little chance of the legislation being advanced during the lame-duck period that follows next week’s election, congressional aides said.
The bill’s quiet collapse puts an end to an unusual episode that briefly riveted Congress, became fodder for late-night comics and fueled water-cooler debate. The Senate’s unanimous vote in March to allow states to permanently shift their clocks caught some of the chamber’s own members by surprise — and in a reverse of traditional Washington dynamics, it was the House slowing down the Senate’s legislation.
Key senators who backed permanent daylight saving time say they’re mystified that their effort appears doomed, and frustrated that they will probably have to start over in the next Congress. At least 19 states in recent years have enacted laws or passed resolutions that would allow them to impose year-round daylight saving time — but only if Congress approves legislation to stop the nation’s twice-per-year time changes, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
“This isn’t a partisan or regional issue, it is a commonsense issue,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who co-authored the Sunshine Protection Act, which passed the Senate in March, said in a statement. Senate staff noted that a bipartisan companion bill in the House, backed by 48 Republicans and Democrats, has been stalled for nearly two years in an Energy and Commerce subcommittee chaired by Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.).
“I don’t know why the House refuses to pass this bill — it seems like they are rarely in session — but I will keep pushing to make this a reality,” Rubio said, taking a swipe at his congressional counterparts.
Rubio and his colleagues’ gloomy mood this fall is a stark contrast from their sunny celebrations when the Senate abruptly passed their bill two days after the “spring forward” clock change, with still-groggy lawmakers campaigning on it as a common-sense reform.
“My phone has been ringing off the hook in support of this bill — from moms and dads who want more daylight before bedtime to senior citizens who want more sun in the evenings to enjoy the outdoors to farmers who could use the extra daylight to work in the fields,” a fundraising email sent in March by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) said.
But behind the scenes, the bill’s forecast was almost immediately cloudy.
Some senators told reporters they were surprised the bill was passed through a parliamentary procedure known as unanimous consent, which eliminates the need for debate or an actual vote count if no senator objects to a measure, and wished there had been a more traditional series of hearings and legislative markups. Sleep experts and neurologists urgently cautioned that shifting away from early-morning sunlight would harm circadian rhythms, sleep-wake cycles and overall health. Groups such as religious Jewish people complained that moving the clocks later in the winter would prevent them from conducting morning prayers after the sun rises and still get to work and school on time.
There also are regional differences in who would most benefit from permanent daylight saving time. Lawmakers in Southern states such as Florida argue it would maximize sunshine for their residents during the winter months — but some people who live in the northern United States or on the western edge of time zones, such as Indianapolis, would not see the sunrise on some winter days until 9 a.m.
And in the House, lawmakers and staff working on the issue pointed to surveys that show deep divides in public opinion about how to proceed. While 64 percent of respondents to a March 2022 YouGov poll said they wanted to stop the twice-per-year changing of the clocks, only about half of the people who favored a change wanted permanent daylight saving time, while about one-third supported permanent standard time and others were unsure.
“We know that the majority of Americans do not want to keep switching the clocks back and forth,” Schakowsky said in a statement to The Post, adding that she had received calls arguing in favor of both sides. Permanent standard time advocates don’t want children to wait in dark winter mornings for a school bus; permanent daylight saving time proponents want to help businesses enjoy more sunshine during operating hours, she said.
A congressional aide who has been working on the issue put it more bluntly: “We’d be pissing off half the country no matter what,” said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss internal deliberations.
The White House has avoided taking a position on the legislation, and in interviews, administration officials said the issue was complicated and affected matters of trade and health.
Pallone and other lawmakers have said they’re waiting on the Transportation Department, which helps govern enforcement of time zones, to review the effects of permanently changing the clocks. While the transportation agency in September agreed to conduct a study, the due date for that analysis — Dec. 31, 2023 — suggests that the issue may not get serious consideration in Congress again until 2024 at the earliest.
And while the lobbying efforts around clock changes pale next to the tens of millions of dollars spent by advocates for so-called Big Pharma or Big Tech, some congressional aides joke that the debate has awakened “Big Sleep”: concerted resistance from sleep doctors and researchers who issued advocacy letters that warned against permanent daylight saving time, traveled to Capitol Hill to pitch lawmakers on permanent standard time instead and significantly ramped up their lobbying spending, according to a review of federal disclosures.
For instance, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, or AASM — which in recent years had focused its advocacy on issues such as improving care for sleep apnea — this year included new priorities in its federal filings: lobbying lawmakers on the Senate’s Sunshine Protection Act and “issues relating to seasonal time changes.”
AASM also nearly doubled its lobbying spending from $70,000 in the third quarter of 2021 to $130,000 in the third quarter of 2022, and added a lobbyist who specializes in health-care issues and used to work for Schakowsky.
The daylight saving time debate roused the sleep-medicine academy’s attention, an official confirmed.
“When the Sunshine Protection Act was passed by the Senate last spring, we determined that advocacy for the establishment of permanent standard time needs to be an immediate priority,” Melissa Clark, the AASM’s director of advocacy and public awareness, wrote in an email.
Clark added that AASM had met with the offices of dozens of legislators to advocate for permanent standard time. “It’s an issue that is relevant to everyone,” she wrote.
It’s also an issue that resonates abroad. Mexican lawmakers passed legislation last month to end daylight saving time in most of their country, a measure that the nation’s president swiftly signed into law.
But not everyone agrees that a change — any change — is necessary.
Josh Barro, a political commentator who has repeatedly argued to preserve the current system, said that neither permanent daylight saving nor permanent standard time make sense.
“I think we have the system we have for good reason … we have a certain number of daylight hours in the day and it’s going to vary depending on the axial tilt of the earth. And we need a way to manage it so that we wake up not too long after sunrise on most days,” Barro said. “It’s really the government solving a coordination problem.”
Beth Ann Malow, a neurologist and sleep medicine researcher at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, stressed that she continues to favor permanent standard time, a position she testified about in a congressional hearing earlier this year. But even Malow says that the United States may end up needing a compromise — moving the clock by 30 minutes, and then staying that way permanently.
“I know that the permanent standard time people and the permanent daylight saving time people will be disappointed because they didn’t get what they wanted, and we will be out of sync with other countries,” Malow said. “But it’s a way to stop going back and forth.”
NYC woman, 74, punched in unprovoked daylight attack
Disturbing new video shows a woman slugging an elderly lady in the face in an unprovoked broad-daylight attack in Midtown this week.
The 74-year-old victim was walking on Madison Avenue near East 52nd Street around 11 a.m. Wednesday when the stranger punched her in the side of the face without saying a word, according to cops and the video.
The senior fell to the ground, landing near the curb. A bystander appeared to come to her aid before the clip cut out.
The victim was taken to NYU Langone Hospital-Manhattan in stable condition.
The suspect – who was still on the loose Friday – appeared to look back once as she stormed away from the victim.
She is shown with her hair up and wearing a white hoodie, black shorts and carrying a black duffel bag.
Ford F-150 Raptor R Ushers Era of Rich People Hauling Gold in Broad CGI Daylight
At long last, after countless rumors, there is a measured Blue Oval response for the absolute pickup truck hoon, the 2022 Ram Trucks 1500 TRX. Alas, something is definitely amiss with the 2023 F-150 Raptor R.
If I had to throw a wild guess, it might be another case of the Mercedes CEO saying the board must have been “drunk” when they approved this – the Mercedes-AMG One hypercar for them, the less powerful and more expensive than TRX Ford Raptor R for the Detroit corner offices. But that is just my assumption based on two simple facts.
No matter how hard you paint a pretty off-road picture; two values are easy to use in any comparison. Arriving later on the market – thus with enough time to study the competition – the 700-horsepower F-150 Raptor R misses the mark on ponies against the 702-hp Ram 1500 TRX. Yes, there’s just a couple of coltish hp in between them, I’ll give them that.
But the pricing difference is much harder to grasp. A 2022 Ford F-150 XL kicks off at $31,520, for example, but that is just a base model. The 2022 Ram Trucks 1500 TRX has a starting MSRP of $78,890. So, how in the world has the Ford pricing department come up with a base $109,145 quotation? Simple, according to an automotive pixel master – they are just targeting rich folks and their desire to haul “whatever it is rich ppl haul around lol.” Like gold, for instance, and lots of it.
Sure, Oscar Vargas, the virtual artist better known as wb.artist20 on social media, is “just having a little fun!” And he also acknowledges that at least the F-150 Raptor R “finally has a V8.” Probably, that should be enough oomph to help it carry a few hundred bars of gold from the owner’s bank to the yacht, mansion on the hill, or the apocalypse man cave he has got lying around somewhere secret…
Harry Styles, James Corden Crash Fans’ Apartment for ‘Daylight’ Video
If you live in a New York apartment and had reason to step out recently, check your Ring doorbell cam footage — you may have missed a knock on the door from Harry Styles and James Corden.
In a segment for “The Late Late Show With James Corden” which aired Thursday night, James Corden offers his directorial eye to Harry Styles for the pop star’s “Daylight” music video, from his third studio album “Harry’s House.”
In the skit, the pair start their trek by knocking on random apartment doors on a residential street in New York, where they get one “I’m about to head out for the day” and another rejection from a woman who — despite the crowd of people taking photos of Styles behind her — kindly declines access to the pop star and late-night host.
“I thought this would be easier Harry, I’ve got to be honest — I thought your face would open a lot of doors,” says Corden, as the duo and their stumbling camera crew continue their search.
Finally, the pair buzz themselves into an apartment under the guise of a pizza delivery, which leads them to the front door of four lucky Styles fans: Isabel, Caroline, Hadley and Sydney.
With Styles hiding in the hall, the girls greet Corden, who asks them permission to film inside their apartment, to which they respond, “Of course!” Corden then takes Styles’ hand, pulling him into the doorframe and revealing him to the girls who all cover their mouths in disbelief.
Variety spoke with the girls ahead of the Styles episode airing, and to say they were excited is an understatement.
“If we knew [they were stopping by] we would’ve at least brushed our hair!” they said, recounting that one fateful afternoon after work when their doorbell rang only to reveal Styles and Corden.
What was only a three-hour-long shoot heralded a series of major events for the girls who say Styles was in the best of spirits — despite the fact that their apartment did not have air conditioning.
“He was also making sure that we were taken care of! He was like, ‘Make sure the girls get water too,’” they say between giggles, remembering the details of their off-camera conversations about work and birthdays.
To start the shoot, the girls take the Styles camp on a tour of their spacious New York apartment (see it to believe it) but made sure to have the star sit out of Hadley’s room, as it was littered with One Direction memorabilia and even a drawing of Styles as Harry Potter.
“I cannot stop thinking about all the things I wish I would’ve said to him,” recalls Hadley — a long-time fan of the boyband. “But now, I’ve written a list of all the things I’d say to him if it ever happens again.”
What Styles didn’t miss, however, was a photo hanging on the wall of the roommates with late-night TV host Jimmy Fallon. “Had we known, we could’ve hid it,” jokes Caroline, to which Corden responds, “I’m deciding not to take that personally.”
In preparation for the music video, Corden directs the girls to “call a few friends, but don’t go crazy” for the video’s party scenes, while he organized the rest of the music video stills.
“I was in a Christopher Nolan movie…” Styles starts to say, gesturing to the girls’ bathroom, “and now this is my dressing room.”
Corden also directs the singer to walk down a hallway with the instruction: “Give me old Mick Jagger,” to which Styles musters up his best Jagger impression — mouth agape and hands up — before switching to: “Give me young Mick Jagger!”
Corden didn’t just stop at creative directing — he also took it upon himself to handle stunts, coming out in a head-to-toe green screen bodysuit to film Styles in his aforementioned glittery costume on the roof, very literally following the song’s opening line, “I’m on a roof.”
Styles shook hands with all of the girls’ friends who had arrived to serve as extras for the party scenes and were directed by Corden, “Don’t treat him like he’s Harry Styles, treat him like someone called Chris.”
The girls say the party scenes were “very much real,” as the album had not yet been released and getting to listen to “Daylight” was more than a treat. “Harry was also very down to mosh,” remembers one of the girls, referencing the stuffy living room party scene.
The segment ends with the premiere of the “Late Late Show and James Corden Production,” a three-minute music video (which only cost Corden $300) that featured multiple cameos from all four girls and of course, stars the smiley singer himself.
Watch the full segment below.
Dead By Daylight Devs Announce Killer Dating Sim Hooked On You
Yesterday the ever-evolving 2022 bingo card got even more unpredictable when Behaviour Interactive, the developer behind popular asymmetrical multiplayer horror game Dead by Daylight, revealed that it’s making a spin-off game in which you can romance your favorite Dead by Daylight killers.
Hooked on You: A Dead by Daylight Dating Sim, is an upcoming dating sim that lets you finally nuzzle up to and romance Dead by Daylight’s murder husbandos and waifus, become platonic friends, or suffer the unyielding fate of deadly awkward silences. The game has multiple “unique endings” wherein, if you play your cards right, you’ll unearth “deeply intimate” facets of the Dead by Daylight killers’ hard-to-read personalities.
How did this little dating sim come into existence? A rep for Behaviour Interactive told Kotaku that Dead by Daylight ran a community survey last year asking players if there was any other type of experience within the world of the game that players were interested in. Turns out, the DbD fandom’s top choice was a dating sim.
“Because it is so completely out there and crazy, we thought we had to do it immediately,” the rep told Kotaku, noting the funny looks and laughter the idea prompted in meetings before they stopped and realized that it was “in fact, genius.”
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“We’ve known for years of our fans’ thirst and some of the more intense fanfic that was created. We want to give them what they want but we also need to present this the right way, with all the seriousness it deserves,” the spokesperson said before noting that the dating sim is being developed in collaboration with Psyop, the folks who brought us the KFC dating sim I Love You, Colonel Sanders!
And now, the moment you’ve been waiting for: the eligible killers in Hooked on You. First up is Evan MacMillan, also known as The Trapper. You should call him the Thirst Trapper because he’s stanced up in a form-fitting singlet swimsuit that leaves nothing to the imagination in his Hooked on You iteration. This is a “Fab Five”-esque upgrade from the bloody disgusting pair of overalls he’s rocking in Dead by Daylight. Y’know what we call that? Growth. Ignore the red stuff on his hands, he was clearly smashing berries before your seaside picnic date.
Next up is the absolute beefcake The Huntress. I have no witty remark on deck for her because I’m twitterpated by her herculean biceps, though I did notice she also has berries smeared on her bunny mask. I guess great minds think alike. The second DbD bachelor is the Nigerian dreamboat, Philip Ojomo, aka The Wraith. He’s repping a matching Hawaiian button-up shirt and swim trunks that I’m about 90 percent sure he bought from The Gap. I’m preemptively deducting points for The Wraith’s basic-bitch fashion sense, though he does have a winning smile. Last, and certainly not least, we have the ever-elusive Spirit, Rin Yamaoka, sporting a sleek silk kimono and an elegant black sun hat ordained with a red spider lily symbolizing the “final goodbye” of your single life.
When asked whether Hooked on You might get more romanceable characters in the future, the spokesperson said, “So many of our fans have their favorite character and they are really looking forward to spending some special time with them. We get it. And while this is the first visual novel in the Dead by Daylight universe, I sense that it is certainly not the last time we tell these sorts of stories. We’ve opened a box here that our fans will never let us close again. Not that we would want to anyway.”
Personally, I’m jockeying for an eventual Hooked on You/Silent Hill crossover with a dummy thicc Pyramid Head rocking a Virgin Killer sweater. It’s not like Konami is doing anything with him. It’s what he deserves.
Hooked on You is slated to release this summer on Steam.
Daylight saving change faces trouble in House
Legislation to make daylight saving time permanent passed the Senate last week, but the House is not ready to be a rubber stamp, spelling potential trouble ahead for its passage in the lower chamber.
Leaders on both sides of the aisle have made clear they are not in a rush to act on the legislation, with some citing the focus on the crisis unfolding in Ukraine, as well as the need for further review from members before taking up the proposal.
And though the idea has enjoyed bipartisan support across Congress, its path in the lower chamber is uncertain, as a few members have begun to call for more research into the proposed measure before signing on to the push.
Rep. Pramila JayapalPramila JayapalProgressive Caucus presses Biden for executive action on student loans, immigration Jan. 6 witnesses to be NBC guests at media dinner Andrew Cockburn discusses the Pentagon’s recent budget allocations MORE (D-Wash.) told The Hill on Friday that, while she has supported doing away with the semiannual time change in the past, she’s gotten mixed reactions from her constituents over the idea.
“I’ve been hearing a lot about this from my constituents recently because we’re in Seattle and it is so dark,” she said, “and so if we make daylight saving permanent, it’s gonna be dark until like nine o’clock in the morning.”
Though Jayapal said she thinks “having one time zone is just easier,” she added that she wants “to pay attention to what people are saying,” while also noting concerns that some have shared about the potential impact the proposed change could have on learning.
Pressed about his stance on the proposal, Rep. Al Green
“I’m going to ask my staff for some empirical studies about this,” he said.
In remarks to The Hill on Friday, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries
“Different members have articulated a different perspective. We’ll have to come to some consensus. We were unexpectedly sent this bill by the Senate. Now, we’re trying to absorb it,” Jeffries said.
The legislation passed by unanimous consent in the Senate on Tuesday. Any senator can use the procedure to fast-track passage of a bill without a vote, but it only takes one senator to object and block it.
A staffer for Sen. Marco Rubio
The staffer said Sen. Roger Wicker
“But by Tuesday afternoon, when we had gotten everything scheduled, [Wicker] had sort of said he was not going through, so by the time that Sen. Rubio went down to the floor Tuesday afternoon, he felt pretty confident that it was going to pass,” the staffer said.
The Hill has reached out to Wicker’s office for comment.
Under the newly passed proposal, daylight saving time would be made permanent, starting November 2023, meaning most who changed their clocks at that time of year would no longer have to.
Rubio has pressed for the House to take swift action on the legislation — a call has also been echoed by Rep. Vern Buchanan
Buchanan told The Hill on Friday that he’s confident the legislation could see passage this year, while also acknowledging recent comments from Speaker Nancy Pelosi
“I’ve heard the Speaker. A lot of people are open-minded to it,” Buchanan said, before adding he thinks it’s likely the lower chamber would see “a strong vote” in favor of the measure if it’s brought to the floor.
But Rep. John Yarmouth (D-Ky.) on Friday afternoon cast doubt on any chance the House would immediately pass the measure, telling The Hill he “can’t imagine” the bill being fast-tracked the same way in the lower chamber that it recently had in the Senate.
“I don’t know that many members have really thought through it,” Yarmouth said, adding most members were kind of “blindsided” by how quickly the Senate approved the proposal. But he anticipates much more opinion on the matter in the near future as public interest around the push has grown.
“Now what will happen is you’ll get all of this outpouring of studies and people say, ‘Yeah, we agree you shouldn’t change twice a year, but what is it, standard time or daylight time?’ And then you get the farm bureaus and the parents associations,” he said, while predicting the “longer it goes, the chances of passage decline.”
“It’ll get more controversial the longer it goes,” Yarmouth said. He also recalled his past experience as a congressional staffer in the early 1970s, when he said the time change emerged as an “emotional issue.”
In 1973, President Nixon signed legislation to put the nation on daylight saving time for about two years, an effort he said was intended to help meet the needs of an energy crisis at the time. But the measure was met with immediate pushback not long after its enactment, prompting the nation to go back to the semiannual time change before the two years were up.
David Prerau, the author of “Seize the Daylight: The Curious and Contentious Story of Daylight Saving Time,” told The Hill that while the idea had been popular when it was proposed, much of the public grew to dislike it during winter.
“All of a sudden, everybody realized that they didn’t like it at all. It made the mornings very, very dark. All of the sunrises were an hour later than it would have been,” Prerau said. “Many, many people were getting up into pitch dark, going to work in the pitch dark, which they disliked. And they also disliked sending their kids to school in the dark, having to walk on dark country roads … so it became very unpopular very quickly.”
According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, over a dozen states have passed or enacted legislation seeking to make daylight saving time permanent in recent years, including Idaho, Louisiana, South Carolina and Utah.
Buchanan, who has been pushing for the change for years, said a driving force behind his campaign was the Florida Legislature’s passage of the legislation seeking the same move. But in order for that legislation to take effect, Rubio’s office has said “a change in the federal statute is required.”
“I’m in the Sunshine State. We want more sunshine. … So we’re going to continue to work on it, and maybe get it out of here, the sooner the better. But we’re building the momentum for it right now,” he said.
Mike Lillis, Tobias Burns and Jordain Carney contributed to this report, which was updated at 8:31 a.m.
Senate plan for permanent daylight saving time faces doubts in the House
Pallone, who held a hearing last week on daylight saving time, said he shares the Senate’s goal to end the “spring forward” and “fall back” clock changes linked to more strokes, heart attacks and car accidents. But he wants to collect more information, asking for a long-delayed federal analysis on how time changes might affect productivity, traffic and energy costs, among other issues.
“There isn’t a consensus, in my opinion in the House, or even generally at this point, about whether we should have standard versus daylight saving as the permanent time,” Pallone said. “Immediately after the Senate passed the bill, I had members come up to me on the floor and say, ‘Oh, don’t do that. I want the standard time,’ ” he added, declining to identify the lawmakers.
The White House also has not communicated its position on permanent daylight saving time, congressional aides said. While President Biden, as a freshman senator, voted for that in December 1973 — the last time that Congress attempted to institute the policy nationwide — he also witnessed the near-immediate collapse of support amid widespread reports that darker winter mornings were contributing to more car accidents and worsened moods. Members of Congress introduced nearly 100 pieces of legislation to change or do away with the law before it was finally repealed in October 1974.
The White House and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D) office declined to answer questions about daylight saving time policy on Friday, referring reporters back to prior statements that the Senate measure was being reviewed.
The Senate plan boasts bipartisan support, led by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the health panel chair and No. 3 Democrat, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). The two steered the bill that passed the chamber on Tuesday through a procedure known as unanimous consent, which eliminates the need for debate or an actual vote count if no senator objects to a measure.
Backers of permanent daylight saving time argue that adding an hour of daylight later in the day would boost commerce and lead to mental health gains, as people go out to shop, eat and spend time outdoors. Murray and Rubio also point to states like Washington and Florida that have sought to adopt permanent daylight saving time but are waiting on federal approval to do so. Their aides said they are working to drum up support for the change among their House counterparts — pushing for a vote as soon as possible, while there is momentum around the idea.
“Springing forward and falling back year after year only creates unnecessary confusion while harming Americans’ health and our economy,” Murray wrote Pelosi in a letter sent Friday that her office shared with The Washington Post. “I hope, once again, for your immediate consideration of this common-sense legislation.”
Lawmakers seeking to change national time policies are working against the clock, said Thomas Gray, a University of Texas at Dallas political science professor who has studied more than a century of congressional legislation on daylight saving time.
The issue “has these unusual dynamics, where there’s really only two weeks of the year where people care about it” — the week in the spring when the clocks spring forward an hour, and the week in the fall when the clocks fall back, Gray said. “It usually takes more than a week to do something in Congress. And it’s hard to fit that time-period when people actually care into the process of passing a bill.”
Tuesday’s successful Senate vote came two days — and several uncomfortable nights of sleep — after Sunday morning’s clock change. But the next clock change is set for Nov. 6 — which would be in the middle of a House recess, and two days before lawmakers stand for election.
The schedule is “a concern for anyone who is in favor of going to permanent daylight saving time,” said Jeffery A. Jenkins, a University of Southern California public-policy professor who has studied the politics of daylight saving time with Gray. “The fact that the House is not ready to move, the Democratic leadership is not ready to move and there are some people out there who probably would not like to go to permanent daylight saving time is a problem. And they have now the opportunity to get together, coordinate and potentially act in a collective way downstream.”
That counter-lobby has already sprung into action, with advocates warning this week that shifting the clock later would lead to winter sunrises after 9 a.m. in cities like Indianapolis and Detroit, forcing schoolchildren and many workers to commute in the dark. Save Standard Time, a nonprofit that has called for permanently adopting standard time, has sent dozens of messages encouraging supporters to contact lawmakers to register their disapproval of the Senate bill.
The office of Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) was deluged with a high volume of calls and letters that reflected a “near-even split in support/opposition on the Senate bill,” spokesperson Aaron Fritschner wrote on Twitter.
Health experts have also renewed their concerns that shifting to permanent daylight saving time would disrupt circadian rhythms by forcing people onto an unnatural sleep schedule.
“Today’s quick action by the Senate allowed for neither a robust discussion, nor a debate,” the American Academy of Sleep Medicine said in a statement after Tuesday’s vote. “We believe that permanent standard time is the best option for health.”
Some senators have said they were surprised by Tuesday’s vote and wished they had realized it was happening. But the bill’s chief backers had repeatedly called for the policy, including in speeches on the Senate floor last year, and Murray and Rubio’s staffers said they spent weeks targeting the March 12 clock change as an ideal moment to put the motion forward, working with the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation to find time on the chamber’s calendar.
Every Senate office last week was also informed of the pending motion after the legislation was “hotlined,” a process by which lawmakers notify their colleagues about unanimous consent requests, Rubio’s spokesperson Dan Holler said. Since the vote, neither Rubio nor Murray’s offices have received complaints from other senators, their aides said.
But House leaders also felt surprised by the outcome and are determined to take their time reviewing the bill, said a senior House aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss pending legislation.
“What’s the old George Washington line? Now the House, as the more deliberative body, will serve as a tea saucer to cool the intemperate passions of the Senate,” the aide wrote in a text message, inverting the oft-quoted saying attributed to the nation’s first president.
The White House is also reviewing the legislation, and two aides told The Post that the Domestic Policy Council and National Economic Council are studying the implications. So far, the administration has declined to push for the change.
“We are obviously coordinated and work closely with Congress on all legislation they consider, but I don’t have a specific position from the administration at this point of time,” spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters on Wednesday.
Congress first instituted daylight saving time in 1919 and has subsequently held multiple votes to lengthen or shorten it. Those efforts climaxed in 1973, when lawmakers voted for a two-year national trial of permanent daylight saving time, spurred on by President Richard M. Nixon, who argued that it would save energy in the midst of an energy crisis triggered by the oil boycott of the United States by the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC.
But amid reports that the dark mornings were leading to traffic accidents, and with little evidence the plan substantially cut energy costs, political figures began calling for the law’s repeal within days of its passage.
By March 1974, a Senate measure to repeal the change narrowly failed in a 48-43 vote; Biden sat out the vote. (The White House did not respond to a question about why Biden did not vote.)
Momentum for repeal built over the spring, as the energy crisis drew to a close, and continued through the summer.
“We have experimented with daylight saving time through one dark winter — and one winter is enough,” said former senator Dick Clark, an Iowa Democrat, calling for repeal on Aug. 15, 1974. “I hope the Senate will take this opportunity to settle the question, not only for this winter, but for those to come.”
The following week, the House voted 383-16 to repeal permanent daylight saving time, which the Senate agreed to in a voice vote in September 1974. President Gerald Ford swiftly signed the bill.
Pallone said that the quick collapse of the 1970s-era plan shows the hazards of rushing to adopt permanent daylight saving time.
″What that points out to you and to me is that you’re not going to make everybody happy, right?” he said in an interview. “That’s why I say, we need to spend some time trying to figure out, is there a consensus?”
As the debate rages, Pallone said some lawmakers have floated an idea in the spirit of Washington compromise.
“I’ve actually had some people tell me, ‘why don’t you just split the difference? … Make it half an hour,’” he said.
Alice Crites contributed to this report.
Senate passes bill that would make Daylight Saving Time permanent
The Sunshine Protection Act passed the chamber by unanimous consent. The bill would still need to pass the House and be signed by President Joe Biden to become law. If the measure clears Congress and is signed into law, it would mean no more falling back every year in the fall.
CNN has reached out to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office for comment on when or if the House will take up the bill and did not immediately receive a response.
Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a sponsor of the legislation, said he doesn’t have any assurance the House will take it up, but “it’s an idea whose time has come.”
Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, who was presiding at the time of the bill’s consideration and who represents Arizona, a state that doesn’t observe Daylight Saving Time, could be heard on the mic saying “Ooh, I love it.” Following its passage, she let out a “Yes!”
The bill has bipartisan backing including several Republican and Democratic cosponsors.
“You’ll see it’s an eclectic collection of members of the United States Senate in favor of what we’ve just done here in the Senate, and that’s to pass a bill to make Daylight Savings Time permanent,” said Rubio in remarks on the Senate floor. “Just this past weekend, we all went through that biannual ritual of changing the clock back and forth and the disruption that comes with it. And one has to ask themselves after a while why do we keep doing it?”
“If we can get this passed, we don’t have to keep doing this stupidity anymore,” added Rubio.
Sen. Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican, expressed support for the bill after being told it had passed.
“I just think the extra hour at the end of the day consistently is better than having it dark when kids go to school and dark when kids get home,” he said.
Rubio noted that the bill delays implementation to November 2023, because, he said, the transportation industry has already built out schedules on the existing time and asked for additional months to make the adjustment.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, the lead Democratic sponsor, said Tuesday ahead of passage of the bill that “this would give us a chance for Americans all across the country to be rid of fall back and make Daylights Savings Time permanent and to add a little sunlight into most people’s lives.”
This story has been updated with additional developments Tuesday.
CNN’s Lauren Fox, Clare Foran and Ted Barrett contributed to this report.
U.S. Senate approves bill to make daylight saving time permanent
WASHINGTON, March 15 (Reuters) – The U.S. Senate on Tuesday passed legislation that would make daylight saving time permanent starting in 2023, ending the twice-annual changing of clocks in a move promoted by supporters advocating brighter afternoons and more economic activity.
The Senate approved the measure, called the Sunshine Protection Act, unanimously by voice vote. The House of Representatives, which has held a committee hearing on the matter, still must pass the bill before it can go to President Joe Biden to sign. The White House has not said whether Biden supports it.
On Sunday, most of the United States resumed daylight saving time, moving ahead one hour. The United States will resume standard time in November.
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Senator Marco Rubio, one of the bill’s sponsors, said after input from airlines and broadcasters that supporters agreed that the change would not take place until November 2023.
The change would help enable children to play outdoors later and reduce seasonal depression, according to supporters.
“I know this is not the most important issue confronting America but it is one of those issues that there is a lot of agreement. … If we can get this passed, we don’t have to do this stupidity anymore,” Rubio added. “Pardon the pun, but this is an idea whose time has come.”
About 30 states since 2015 have introduced legislation to end the twice-yearly changing of clocks, with some states proposing to do it only if neighboring states do the same.
The House Energy and Commerce committee held a hearing on the issue this month. Representative Frank Pallone, the committee’s chairman, said that “the loss of that one hour of sleep seems to impact us for days afterwards. It also can cause havoc on the sleeping patterns of our kids and our pets.”
Pallone backs ending the clock switching but has not decided whether to support daylight or standard time as the permanent choice.
Pallone cited a 2019 poll that found that 71% of Americans prefer to no longer switch their clocks twice a year.
Supporters say the change could prevent a slight uptick in car crashes that typically occurs around the time changes and point to studies showing a small increase in the rate of heart attacks and strokes soon after the time change.
“It has real repercussions on our economy and our daily lives,” said Senator Ed Markey, another leading sponsor.
Supporters argue it could help businesses such as golf courses that could draw more use with more evening daylight.
The use of daylight saving time has been in place in nearly all of the United States since the 1960s after being first tried in 1918. Year-round daylight savings time was adopted in 1973 in a bid to reduce energy use because of an oil embargo and repealed a year later.
The bill would allow Arizona and Hawaii, which do not observe daylight saving time, to remain on standard time.
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Reporting by David Shepardson
Editing by Will Dunham and Chizu Nomiyama
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.