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Cotton blocks Trump-backed effort to make daylight savings time permanent

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Sen. Tom Cotton wasn’t fast enough in 2022 to block Senate passage of legislation that would make daylight savings time permanent. Three years later, he wasn’t about to repeat that same mistake.

The Alabama Republican was on hand Tuesday afternoon to thwart a bipartisan effort on the chamber floor to pass a bill that would put an end to changing the clocks twice a year, including this coming Sunday.

“If permanent Daylight Savings Time becomes the law of the land, it will again make winter a dark and dismal time for millions of Americans,” said Cotton in his objection to a request by Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) to advance the bill by unanimous consent.

“For many Arkansans, permanent daylight savings time would mean the sun wouldn’t rise until after 8:00 or even 8:30am during the dead of winter,” Cotton continued. “The darkness of permanent savings time would be especially harmful for school children and working Americans.”

A cross-party coalition of lawmakers has been trying for years to make daylight savings time the default, which would result in more daylight in the evening hours with less in the morning, plus bring to a halt to biannual clock adjustments.

President Donald Trump endorsed the concept this spring, calling the changing of the clocks “a big inconvenience and, for our government, A VERY COSTLY EVENT!!!”

His comments coincided with a hearing, then a markup, of Scott’s legislation in the Senate Commerce Committee. It set off an intense lobbying battle in turn, pitting the golf and retail industries — which is advocating for permanent daylight savings time —against the likes of sleep doctors and Christian radio broadcasters — who prefer standard time.

Joined by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) in calling for the Senate to pass the bill Tuesday, Scott cited states’ rights as a major reason for his support for the so-called “Sunshine Protection Act.”

“It allows the people of each state to choose what best fits their needs and the needs of their families,” said Scott. “The American people are sick and tired of changing their clocks twice a year. It’s confusing, unnecessary and completely outdated.”

There was hope earlier this year that momentum was growing for the quixotic legislative campaign after progress stalled following senators’ success in 2022 to pass a version of Scott’s bill by unanimous consent — an outcome typically reserved for noncontroversial bills that took lawmakers by surprise.

Cotton on Tuesday decried the “abject failure” of the last time Congress enacted permanent daylight savings time in 1974, pledging to always oppose legislation that would do just that.

He said he took “full responsibility” for dropping the ball in 2022, explaining he hadn’t adequately communicated the extent of his opposition and that he had expected another senator to object.

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Congress

Republicans are growing tired of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s shutdown attacks

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) is on the warpath against her own party’s handling of the government shutdown. And her fellow Republicans are increasingly calling her out.

The firebrand three-term lawmaker, long an ally of President Donald Trump, has distanced herself from Republican leadership in recent months. And as the shutdown drags on, Greene’s loud — and usually lonely — dissent risks fracturing Republicans’ efforts to present a united front and pressure Democrats into caving on funding the government.

“Don’t spend much time worrying about [what] Marjorie is saying,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday.

While a few other Republicans have criticized the party’s approach to the shutdown, Greene has been the loudest and most prominent detractor. She’s focused on expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies — which Democrats have made their central demand — and accused her party of ignoring the issue.

“Not a single Republican in leadership talked to us about this or has given us a plan to help Americans deal with their health insurance premiums DOUBLING!!!” she wrote in a social media post in early October.

Republicans have continually indicated they’ll negotiate on health care premiums only after the shutdown. House Speaker Mike Johnson has tried to brush off Greene’s attacks and defuse the tension, telling reporters that GOP-led conversations on health care are happening in other channels.

“Bless her heart, that’s an absurd statement,” he told CNN when asked last week to comment on Greene’s assertion that the Republicans were “sitting on the sidelines” on health care.

Greene has only ramped up her critiques of the speaker and his team, with the shutdown now well into its fourth week, writing on X on Tuesday that Johnson “said he’s got ideas and pages of policy ideas and committees of jurisdiction are working on it, but he refused to give one policy proposal to our GOP conference on our own conference call.”

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) on BLN late Tuesday called on Greene to put her own health care plan forward — and to stop attacking her party.

“I like her, she came out to Ohio a few times,” he said. “She’s certainly able to write a bill herself. Like if this is something she’s passionate about, put pen to paper, write a bill. Present an option. Don’t just criticize what other people are doing.”

Greene’s disagreement with Republicans stretches beyond the shutdown. She broke party ranks by calling Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocidein July and was one of just a handful of Republicans to sign a discharge petition from Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) that would force a floor vote on the Epstein files.

Greene’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the party, Cruz said, is moving on.

“Suddenly, Marjorie is for massive government spending and taxes and she’s for open borders and amnesty. Ok fine,” he said Wednesday. “That is not where the American people are. Where the American people are, is real simple. We’re on day 29 of the stupidest shutdown.”

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John Thune says he plans to meet with Democrats about ending shutdown

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Wednesday he expects to meet soon with a group of rank-and-file House Democrats about ending the 29-day-and-counting government shutdown.

If the meeting happens, it would be a rare bipartisan gathering involving a top party leader. So far this month, Thune and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have not met to discuss an exit path to the shutdown, leaving it to a small group of dealmaking members who have engaged in informal, on-and-off talks.

Those conversations have heated up in recent days, members of both parties say, as major ramifications bear down including the possible lapse of federal food aid for 42 million Americans.

“They’re looking for an off-ramp,” Thune told reporters.

“What I told them all along is, as soon as they’re ready to open up the government, that we will ensure that they have a process whereby they can have the chance to get their legislation voted on, their policies voted on,” he added. “I think they’ve become more interested, and I hope that’s continues.”

Thune made his comments after participating in an angry floor exchange with Democratic Sen. Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico, who sought to pass a patch for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by unanimous consent.

The normally mild-mannered South Dakota Republican boiled over at points as he lambasted Democrats over what he called a “cynical” ploy to extend food assistance without fully reopening the government.

“You all have just figured out 29 days in that there might be some consequences,” he yelled.

Thune tried to offer the House-passed continuing resolution instead, but Luján objected, and Thune ultimately blocked the legislation.

“Sorry I channeled a little bit of anger there,” Thune told reporters leaving the floor, saying that allowing the SNAP patch to pass would extend the shutdown “another two or three weeks.”

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Government shutdown could lead to $14B in lost GDP, CBO reports

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The ongoing federal shutdown could cost the U.S. economy between $7 billion and $14 billion, according to a new report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The report, prepared in response to a request from House Budget Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), estimated the economic impact of the shutdown if it lasts four weeks — a mark hit Wednesday — six weeks, or two months.

Under all three scenarios, the CBO expects economic growth to be back on track after 2026, but some of the real gross domestic product loss resulting from furloughs of federal workers will not be recovered. That permanent loss could be anywhere from $7 billion, if the shutdown were to end now, and $14 billion, if it were to drag on for an additional month.

The Trump administration has placed about 750,000 federal workers on furlough, and many more are currently working without pay, although their ability to claim back pay after the government reopens — a standard precedent under previous government shutdowns — appears uncertain.

The CBO also anticipates that real GDP will be anywhere from 1 to 2 percentage points lower in the fourth quarter of 2025 than it would have been if the government remained open.

“The effects of the shutdown on the economy are uncertain. Those effects depend on decisions made by the Administration throughout the shutdown,” CBO Director Phillip Swagel wrote in the report.

The economic impacts of the shutdown will also be exacerbated when the federal government ceases disbursements of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits beginning Nov. 1, per the CBO.

The Department of Agriculture, which administers the program in partnership with states, has decided not to tap emergency funds to keep food aid flowing amid the shutdown — a move being challenged by Democratic leaders of more than two dozen states.

While a resolution to reopen the government remains elusive, Senate Majority Leader John Thune told POLITICO on Wednesday that talks to end the shutdown have “picked up.”

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