About WatchGov

An independent civic transparency tool that tracks lobbying money, stock trading conflicts, lawsuits, and donor-vote alignment for elected officials - based entirely on disclosed records and vote history, not self-reported statements.

Transparency Risk Score - 4 Components

ComponentMax PointsWhat It Measures
Lobby Money25 ptsTotal career lobbying contributions received. Scaled per $100K received, capped at 25.
Vote Alignment35 ptsPercentage of tracked votes that align with the politician's top donors' positions.
Stock Conflicts25 ptsTrades made while in office that conflict with committee roles or upcoming legislation. +10 pts for any single trade >= $500K.
Legal Record15 ptsLawsuits, ethics investigations, FEC violations. Weighted by severity: High=7, Medium=4, Low=1.
Total Score = Lobby Score + Alignment Score + Stock Score + Legal Score

Lobby Score    = min(25, total_lobby_$ / 100,000 x 1.2)
Alignment Score = (donor-aligned votes / total votes) x 35
Stock Score    = (conflict trades x 5) + (10 if any trade >= $500K)
Legal Score    = Sum severity weights, capped at 15
! A high score identifies where financial incentives and official power overlap statistically. It does not prove illegal activity. A low score does not certify integrity - only that no significant conflicts were detected in the tracked data.

Score Bands

CRITICAL (75-100): Multiple financial conflicts across lobbying, trading, and legal domains.
HIGH RISK (50-74): Significant donor-vote correlation and/or stock trading conflicts.
ELEVATED (25-49): Some correlation; warrants monitoring.
LOW RISK (0-24): No major financial conflicts detected in tracked data.

Data Sources

FEC.gov - Congress.gov - Senate Stock Watcher - House Stock Watcher - CourtListener - OpenSecrets.org - Ballotpedia - ProPublica (archived) - National Governors Association

Open Source

WatchGov is fully open source. View the code on GitHub ->