US President Donald Trump has increased pressure on Senate Republicans to make daylight saving time permanent, naming one committee member for delaying a bill that would have abolished twice-a-year clock changes.
On Saturday, President Trump accused Sen. Tom Cotton of “supporting” the Sunshine Protection Act in a social media post. President Trump has dubbed this the “No Clock Changing Act.”
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“For some reason, Tom is blocking the bill, but in the Senate it’s very easy. It only takes one,” Trump wrote about the Arkansas Republican on his Truth Social account. “It should be passed overwhelmingly in a bipartisan manner.”
“Nobody wants to spend their precious time turning back the clock twice a year and running around everywhere. Sunshine in the afternoon is better than in the early morning,” he added.
Mr. Trump went further, releasing a phone number he claimed was Mr. Cotton’s and imploring Arkansans to put pressure on him. The move echoed the moment in the 2016 Republican presidential primary when then-candidate Trump revealed Sen. Lindsey Graham’s number after receiving criticism from his former rival.
Al Jazeera called the phone number listed in Trump’s post, but received an automated message saying the voicemail box was full. Cotton’s press secretary and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
The president has regularly urged Senate Republicans to pass legislation mandating year-round daylight savings, which would end the decades-old practice of Americans changing their clocks twice a year to get more daylight. On Friday, President Trump urged the U.S. Senate to approve the bill, which passed the House in July by a vote of 308 to 117.
Cotton has previously opposed the bill, arguing in a speech before the full U.S. Senate last year that it would mean farmers, construction workers, commuters and school children starting their day in the dark during the winter.
Trump disputed that argument in another post Saturday, saying the bill “would be a very nice and easy win for Republicans.”
“If Tom Cotton put Arkansas first, he would give Arkansas an extra hour of daylight, and more importantly, they wouldn’t have to run around their homes, farms, workplaces, and everywhere else twice a year to change their clocks and remember to do so often,” Trump wrote.
Trump, an avid golfer, also highlighted the PGA Tour, which he believes is another selling point of the bill.
“As an example, the PGA Tour needs more daylight in the afternoon to finish tournaments,” he wrote in a post that also included a letter from PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolup supporting the bill. “As well as ordinary golfers, tennis players, hunters, and perhaps more importantly, farmers who want more sunlight to play and work.”
The US president, who spent part of Saturday at a golf club in Sterling, Virginia, indicated in a subsequent post that he had received personal feedback on the proposal: “I don’t know about anyone else, but a table full of very prominent people said they hate going home at night right after a forced time change. And it’s gloomy. Depressing!”
In 1974, the U.S. Congress temporarily instituted year-round daylight savings time in response to the nation’s energy crisis. But Congress repealed the law less than a year later, citing safety concerns about children commuting to school before sunrise.
U.S. senators left Washington this week but have no plans to return until after the Nov. 3 midterm elections.
Some lawmakers, including Sen. John Kennedy, were not optimistic that Senate Republican Leader John Thune would bring the bill to a vote before Election Day.
“Disco is obsolete,” a Louisiana Republican told Reuters this week, referring to President Trump’s push to make daylight saving time permanent. “My feeling is it’s going to be difficult to pass…I don’t think the leaders are going to bring it up.”
