A long-running split over the clock spilled into public view on Saturday, when President Donald Trump put an Arkansas phone number online and told people to “Call Tom.” The number belonged to Sen. Tom Cotton, the Associated Press reported, and Trump used the post to push the Republican to back a bill that would lock the country onto daylight saving time year-round.
That bill, the Sunshine Protection Act, cleared the House in July and is now stuck in the Senate. Some Republicans are firmly against it. The White House and other backers say Americans would get more light in the hours when they are usually out and active. People against the change say winter mornings would stay dark longer, and that darkness could be riskier for children standing at bus stops and for parents driving to work.
The timing sits only weeks before the midterms, when many in the party would rather hear Trump talk about prices and what Republicans have already done in office. Cotton is on the ballot in November, though his race is not seen as close. States that do not want the shift could still stay out: the bill lets a legislature opt out before the law takes effect, and some states already skip daylight saving time.
The posts kept coming through Saturday afternoon
Before he left the White House for a rally in Vandalia, Ohio, Trump told reporters the twice-a-year switch is a headache. “It’s a lot of work for a lot of people, running around for two days, changing all the clocks in the house,” he said. “It discombobulates everybody.” He also said golfers lose time on the greens and tennis players lose time on the courts, and he pointed to Cotton as the reason the bill has not moved.
His morning post was aimed straight at Cotton’s state. “So, everyone in Arkansas, a State I love, and won 3 times, the last by by 34 points, tell Tom to, GET IT DONE! It will be appreciated by all,” Trump wrote, and he attached a number with an Arkansas area code.
Cotton, who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee and sits in Republican leadership, answered later that afternoon. The debate over permanent daylight saving time is far from settled in Washington, as Donald Trump calling time on the Sunshine Protection Act heads to a House floor vote.
Other GOP senators oppose permanent daylight saving time as well, but he has been one of the loudest. “No one likes changing the clock, me included, but Congress has enacted permanent Daylight Savings Time multiple times before and repealed it each time once Americans experienced absurdly late sunrises in the winter,” he wrote. “Arkansans don’t want their kids going to school in the pitch dark, and I’ll always put Arkansas first.”
Trump did not leave that claim alone. “If Tom Cotton were putting Arkansas first, he would give them an extra hour of daylight and, more importantly, they wouldn’t have to run all over their houses, farms, work places, and everywhere else, twice a year, having to change their Clocks, and often forgetting to do so,” he posted, then added that “that is really putting Arkansas FIRST.”
On the ride back from his golf course, Trump said people at his table had just complained about the same thing. “A table full of very distinguished people just told me that they HATE, immediately after a mandatory time change, going home at night – and it’s DARK,” he wrote. “It’s depressing!” He quoted one of them as saying, “I just hate going home in darkness,” and then wrote, “It’s also, in Crime Ridden Blue States, a lot more dangerous to be walking home in the dark!”
Public polling leans toward evening light, not the current setup. In a 2025 survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, most adults said that if they had to pick, they would keep the extra hour of daylight at night. Just 12% favor changing the clocks twice a year, 47% oppose that system, and 40% are neutral. Congress has argued over the practice since it began as a wartime step in 1942. Four years ago the Senate passed a permanent-daylight bill, and the House never took it up.
Trump has put a senator’s private number out before. In the 2016 primary, the late Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina called him “unfit for office” after Trump attacked the military record of Sen. John McCain of Arizona. Trump’s feuds have a long history, even as his approval hits new lows and the GOP faces the prospect of losing the House and Senate.
Trump then published Graham’s cellphone number. Graham later filmed himself smashing a run of flip phones, and in time he became a close Trump ally. Cotton and Trump are not described as close, even where their views line up.
They have also split on security and confirmation fights. Cotton has wanted a harder line on Iran while Trump has looked at pauses in strikes during the seven-month war. In the first term, Cotton fought a sentencing overhaul and labeled it a “jailbreak.”
Earlier this year, he tried to move Jay Clayton’s hearing for director of national intelligence faster than Trump wanted. Trump had hoped Bill Pulte, his interim choice after Tulsi Gabbard left, would hold the job at least briefly. Pulte had no known national security background, and both parties criticized the pick.
Speeding Clayton’s confirmation could have blocked Pulte from serving as acting director. Trump told Clayton not to show up for Cotton’s committee. Pulte stayed in the role for several weeks this summer, and the Senate confirmed Clayton in late July.
Published: Oct 4, 2026 07:00 am