How We Score Officials
Transparent, evidence-based, and applied equally to every elected official — regardless of party.
"This profile is scored using voting history, bill sponsorship, bipartisan legislative activity, consistency, and accountability metrics — applied equally across all officials regardless of party. Both positive and negative actions are included. No party is assumed to be right or wrong."
Our Purpose
The Everyday American tracks what elected officials actually do — not what they say. We compile voting records, bill sponsorship data, and legislative activity into a single, readable profile for every member of Congress. Our goal is simple: give ordinary Americans access to the same factual record that political insiders already have, presented in plain language that anyone can understand. We are not affiliated with any political party, advocacy group, or ideology. We do not score officials based on whether we agree with them. We score them based on what they did.
The Scoring Framework
Every official is evaluated using the same framework, regardless of party. Democrats, Republicans, and Independents are all measured the same way. Scores run from 0 to 100. A higher score reflects stronger documented performance in that area — not ideological alignment. An official can score well in some categories and poorly in others. No official is assumed to be good or bad based on party. Scores are divided into two main groups: • Policy Voting Record — based on actual votes • Accountability & Performance — based on record, consistency, and effectiveness
Policy Categories (0–100 each)
Healthcare
Votes on health insurance access, Medicare, Medicaid, drug pricing, hospital funding, and public health programs.
Education
Votes on K-12 funding, student loan programs, Pell Grants, school choice, teacher pay, and higher education access.
Environment
Votes on climate legislation, EPA regulation, clean energy, public land management, and pollution standards.
Economy
Votes on job creation, minimum wage, trade agreements, corporate regulation, small business programs, and tax policy.
Civil Rights
Votes on voting rights, anti-discrimination legislation, immigration policy, civil liberties, and equal protection.
Foreign Policy
Votes on military spending, international alliances, defense posture, foreign aid, and diplomatic agreements.
Debt & Spending
Votes on appropriations, continuing resolutions, deficit spending, and fiscal responsibility measures.
Accountability Categories (0–100 each)
Trustworthiness
Covers documented ethics issues, financial disclosure compliance, campaign finance transparency, and public accountability concerns. This is not based on opinion — only verifiable records.
Consistency
Measures how well an official's voting record matches their stated priorities and campaign positions. If an official campaigns on a position and votes against it, that inconsistency is reflected here.
Legislative Effectiveness
Measures meaningful legislative output — not just bill count. Factors include: bills that advanced to committee or floor vote, bills that became law, bipartisan co-sponsorship, and overall legislative engagement. Raw volume alone does not produce a high score.
Bipartisan Work
Bipartisan activity is explicitly rewarded in the Legislative Effectiveness score. An official who passes legislation with support from both parties demonstrates a higher level of practical effectiveness than one who only sponsors bills along party lines. We count bipartisan sponsorship, co-sponsorship, and passage across party lines as meaningful indicators of real-world impact. This is not a political judgment. It is a measure of whether an official can get things done in a divided environment.
How the Overall Score Is Calculated
The overall score is a weighted composite: • Policy Voting Record (60% weight): average of all policy category scores • Accountability & Performance (40% weight): average of trustworthiness, consistency, and legislative effectiveness An official with strong policy votes but poor legislative effectiveness will not receive a perfect overall score. An official with high effectiveness but some weaker policy areas will see that reflected. Both strengths and weaknesses are included. Nothing is cherry-picked.
Data Sources & Updates
Member data (names, photos, committees, social links, term dates) is sourced from the unitedstates/congress-legislators repository on GitHub — an authoritative, community-maintained dataset used by major news organizations and government transparency projects. Legislative activity (roll call votes, bill sponsorships, session data) is sourced from the LegiScan API, which aggregates official congressional records. Profiles are updated on a scheduled basis — typically weekly for member information and daily for new vote activity. The date of the most recent update is shown on each official's profile. Score calculations are re-run automatically when new voting data is synced. Plain-English summaries and category explanations are generated by AI and cross-checked against the underlying data records.
What We Do Not Do
We do not assign ideology scores. We do not rank officials on a left-right axis. We do not determine what the "correct" vote is on any bill. We do not compare officials to an ideological standard. We do not favor or penalize any party by default. If an action appears positive or negative in our data, it is because the action itself — a yes vote, a no vote, a sponsorship, or an effectiveness outcome — produced that score, not because we decided in advance how to score it. The score is the output of the data. It is not the other way around.