About
ProjectGov users choose whether to support or oppose currently active legislation from the U.S. Congress.
- A valid U.S. telephone number is required.
- Participation is voluntary and anonymous to other users.
- Bills and joint resolutions are the primary means by which congress creates laws and are thus the only legislation available for user input.
- Users can change their position at any time while legislation is active.
- User results and congressional votes are always available.
- User results are not enforceable and are for informational purposes only.
What ProjectGov Does
- Allows users to express support or opposition to currently active legislation
- Presents real legislative text and status information
- Aggregates user results in real-time and updates congressional activity daily
- Enables comparisons of user and congressional support for legislation that may eventually become law
ProjectGov passively mirrors the legislative process by providing users legislation in full text and summary without modification after it is made publicly available by congress. Users then decide whether to support, oppose, or remain neutral.
What ProjectGov Does Not Do
- Rewrite legislation
- Issue endorsements or mandates
- Compel participation
- Claim to represent the public at-large
Components
- Some legislation contains substantively distinct provisions that can be considered independent of the legislation in which it is contained.
- Provisions meeting this criteria are identified as components.
- Users vote on each component and the legislation as a whole.
The intent is to consider which provisions are broadly supported or opposed and to compare that to level of support for the legislation as a whole. Consideration of the parts versus the whole is critical to understanding seemingly inconsistent congressional votes and why legislation with broad public support can still fail.
Component Identification
Components are identified using published, non-ideological criteria based on:
- Independent legal effect
- Independent budgetary effect (separate funding)
- Independent effective start or stop dates
- Distinct implementing authority
- Distinct affected populations
- The validity of other provisions remains intact when excluded
Purely technical or definitional provisions are not treated as components.
Component Limits and Grouping
To preserve usability and meaningful participation:
- Five component maximum
- When there are more than five qualifying provisions, less impactful provisions are grouped into common components.
- Grouping is algorithmic, automated, and politically independent.
We deconstruct complex legislation into five or fewer components to encourage maximum participation, and to ensure that results are more closely aligned to what would be expected from the population at-large.
Results
- Results include total participants and the percentage who are in support of, opposed to, or remain neutral for each legislative item and its components.
- When legislation is amended, components may be added, modified, or removed by comparing the previous components to newly generated ones.
- User results at the time of amendment are recorded.
- Current results reflect any change in user support since the last component change.
- Original and subsequent results after each component change are accessible for comparison.
- User submissions not updated through two component changes are not included in current or future results.
- Results are never modified by ProjectGov.
By recording results when components change, user interest and support can be gauged for each substantively distinct version of the legislation.
Governance and Oversight
- Automated tools assist with text analysis, component identification, grouping, and presentation.
- When possible, final content is human reviewed before publication.
- Methods, criteria, and limitations are published for transparency.
Our goal is to present accurate classification and summarization of legislation for user consideration; however, we rely on automated tools to produce content. Summaries and bulleted information is derived solely from material made publicly available by congress and other governmental agencies. Misinterpreted data formats and the use of generative AI may result in errors. Human review, while prioritized, is lmited by funding and availability.
Purpose
ProjectGov exists to:
- Educate users on the legislative process from beginning to end.
- Allow users to express support or opposition at each step of the legislative process.
- Gauge user interest and sentiment over time.
- Provide a means of democratic participation from an informed perspective in an environment free from partisan and special interests.