Early Voting Rules Legislation Calls for Shorter Waiting Times for All 50 States

The push for new legislation that would reduce the waiting time facing voters at the polls has already started this week just as the newly sworn-in Congress begins anew.

A new bill proposed this week would allow 15 days of early voting in all 50 states while cutting down on the wait time that voters in some areas are faced with.

The issue became a topic of discussion during the November elections. In some places such as certain counties of Florida, voters had to wait for hours in line. Meanwhile, in Arizona, the tally of thousands of provisional votes delayed the final election results for days.

For years, critics have claimed that those delays were targeting minorities in an effort to reduce their turnout at the polls.

That issue could be remedied by a new bill offered by Democratic U.S.  Reps. James E. Clyburn, D-S.C., and George Miller, D-Calif., which they say would protect the rights of voters to cast their ballots.

In a joint statement released on Miller's web site, both Congressman say that the bill "ensures that voters are no longer left to spend their Election Day waiting in line, and it offers the federal government more tools to ensure voter access to the polls."

"Further action is needed to guarantee that the right to vote is protected; but this measure marks a critical first step in the path to reform and offers an immediate remedy to some of the greatest challenges in our elections," the statement read.

"The framers of the Constitution established a government determined and defined by the will of the people, shaped by the decisions of the voters, and sustained by free and fair elections.  In this Congress, let us reaffirm these basic principles of self-government by enacting the SIMPLE Voting Act and ensuring every eligible voter can fully participate in our democracy," the release concluded.

If passed, the bill would add more state workers and voting equipment, in addition to polling places where people may cast ballots earlier than the election date.

However, Republicans have argued that early voting in critical states like Ohio and Florida would cause a strain on officials getting ready for the election. Early voting tends to lean towards Democratic candidates.

Republicans blocked the bill when proposed this week in the U.S. House of Representatives.

"It's pretty hard to understand why anybody would be opposed to enhancing the existing right to vote in light of the fact that it's fairly well established that fraud is not a real concern," Daniel Weiss, Miller's chief of staff, told ABC News Univision. "It's a fabricated concern on the part of Republicans who wanted to minimize young people's right to vote, minorities' right to vote, and seniors' right to vote, because they know Democrats receive a lot of votes from those constituencies."