Fact Check

No, Congress Didn't Permanently End Daylight Saving Time in Early 2022

Clocks were turned back one hour as usual in November 2022, sparking questions about the obligatory annual circadian rhythm disruption.

Published Nov. 7, 2022

 (CHRIS DELMAS/AFP via Getty Images)
Image Via CHRIS DELMAS/AFP via Getty Images
Claim:
A law was passed in March 2022 permanently ending Daylight Saving Time in the United States.
Context

Such a bill was indeed passed by the U.S. Senate but stalled in the House of Representatives, so as of this writing, Daylight Saving Time is still on the books for now.

On Nov. 6, 2022, Daylight Saving Time ended, once again, with clocks being turned back one hour, prompting confusion among some, because U.S. Congress had seemed poised to end the yearly time change earlier in the year.

The confusion may be best embodied by a Seattle Times headline from an article dated Sept. 9, 2022: "Daylight saving ends soon. Wait, didn't lawmakers vote to end this?"

The reason some had been laboring under the incorrect assumption that, come Fall 2022, there would be no "fall back" change in the clocks is because in March 2022, the Senate did agree to end the practice by passing the Sunshine Protection Act, but the bill stalled in the House of Representatives, so as of this writing, it hasn't become law. Even if both houses of Congress had passed the bill at that time, it wouldn't have gone into effect until 2023.

So we would have been falling back in November 2022 regardless.

The time change is sometimes the source of internet rumors and jokes, such as a false claim that Stonehenge, the famous ancient rock formation in England, is "reset" every year to accommodate it. In 2020, a Norwegian official apologized to fellow Norwegians about the fact that setting clocks back had the effect of making that bruising year one hour longer.

[See also: The Origins of Daylight Saving Time]

Sources

LaCapria, Kim. "The Origins of Daylight Saving Time." Snopes, 11 Mar. 2017, https://www.snopes.com/news/2017/03/11/origins-daylight-saving-time/.

Palma, Bethania. "Did Daylight Saving Official Apologize for Making 2020 Longer?" Snopes, 27 Oct. 2020, https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/daylight-savings-apology/.

Shepardson, David. "U.S. Senate Approves Bill to Make Daylight Saving Time Permanent." Reuters, 16 Mar. 2022. www.reuters.com, https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-senate-approves-bill-that-would-make-daylight-savings-time-permanent-2023-2022-03-15/.

Bethania Palma is a journalist from the Los Angeles area who has been working in the news industry since 2006.

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