Built on the official record.
Every figure on PolicySpan traces back to an official government filing or public data set. Here's what that means, what goes in, and what each score and signal is actually measuring.
Our sources
Everything on PolicySpan is built on official government disclosures and public data.
Campaign finance comes from official federal, state, and local filings. Demographic and economic context comes from the U.S. Census. We don't use third-party aggregators or scraped data sets. If a figure appears on PolicySpan, it traces back to an official source you could look up yourself. For the source behind each layer, see Data & Sourcing.
The sections below describe what each score and signal measures. The specific model inputs, weightings, and thresholds behind them are proprietary.
Money, votes & networks
Bill tracking, vote records, lobbying activity, and contribution history are drawn directly from official disclosures at each level of government, then joined so the financial context behind a bill, a race, or a vote sits in one place. Quantitative figures are sourced straight from the filings.
Donor capacity & geography
Geographic scores estimate where high-capacity political donors are concentrated, and flag the industries and policy-relevant conditions that characterize an area. They combine official contribution history with public Census indicators. These are directional signals for prioritizing outreach, not predictions about any individual.
Partisan lean
Where sufficient official contribution data exists, partisan lean is derived from the party of the committees receiving an area's contributions. Where that data is thin, a clearly-labeled demographic estimate is used as a fallback and marked as such wherever it appears.
Interpretive analysis
Some views pair the underlying filings with AI-generated synthesis. Every quantitative figure is sourced from official filings; interpretive analysis is labeled "PolicySpan Analysis" throughout and should be treated as one input among several, not a definitive statement of intent or behavior.
Neutrality
The same sources and the same methodology apply to every candidate, committee, and donor, regardless of party. PolicySpan reports the record; it doesn't argue with it.
Questions about a specific figure or its source? Reach out at rj@policyspan.ai.