On March 15, the United States Senate unanimously passed the Sunshine Protection Act, which would make daylight saving time (the current time as of writing) permanent starting in 2023. The bill still needs to be passed in the House of Representatives and signed by the President before being made into law.

The bill was first introduced in the Senate by Marco Rubio, a Republican Senator for Florida, who acknowledged that there are more pressing issues, but that many people agree on how this one should be resolved.

“I know this is not the most important issue confronting America, but it’s one of those issues where there’s a lot of agreement,” Rubio said. “If we can get this passed, we don’t have to do this stupidity anymore.”

Though the bill would make daylight saving time permanent, Arizona and Hawaii would remain in standard time since they currently do not observe daylight saving time.

The bill has yet to pass in the House of Representatives, which is currently undecided on what to do. Al Green, a Democrat Representative for Texas, said he needed to confer with his staff before making a decision.

“I’m going to ask my staff for some empirical studies about this,” Green said.

John Yarmouth, a Democrat Representative for Kentucky, told The Hill about his doubts regarding the bill.

“I don’t know that many members have really thought through it,” Yarmouth said. “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.”

Some students at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette have voiced their opinions about the bill.

Doc Theriot, a freshman majoring in computer science, shared that she thinks that scientists should make the decisions, not politicians. 

“I don’t think they should have made daylight savings a bill because it has to do with the way the planets move. I think decisions like this shouldn’t be made by politicians but instead scientists,” said Theriot.

Ava Blanchard is a sophomore at the university and doesn’t understand why they’re trying to change it and doesn’t mind if it stays the same as it has always been. 

“I don’t really mind it, and if anything that would kind of confuse me a little bit to change it,” Blanchard said. 

Bailey Stock, a sophomore majoring in music education said she would love more sun in the daytime. 

“ As long as we can get more sun in the daytime, I would love it. We wouldn’t have to fix our sleep schedules, which makes the roads riskier the following day,” said Stock.

Hailey Poche, a freshman majoring in Music Education likes daylight savings time, but also thinks we should change things up. 

“ I agree with the bill. I like switching things back and forth from daylight savings time, but it’s nice to change things up,” said Poche. 

According to UL Lafayette senior Lynn Wills, she’s 100% for this change to make it permanent.

“I don’t like the time switch. It always messes with my circadian rhythm,” Wills said.