Congress.gov Intelligence - US Congressional Data API

Extract comprehensive US Congressional data from the official Congress.gov API. Get bills, amendments, members, votes, committees, hearings, nominations, treaties, and CRS research reports.

Why This Actor?

• Official API Source - Direct access to the Library of Congress Congress.gov API
• No Bot Protection - API-based, 100% reliable data extraction
• Comprehensive Coverage - 10 data types covering all congressional activities
• AI Relevance Scoring - Automatic 0-100 scoring based on recency and importance
• Full Details Mode - Get sponsors, cosponsors, summaries, actions, and bill text
• Search & Filter - Find bills by keyword, congress, date range, and more

Use Cases

• Political Research - Track legislation on specific topics
• Lobbying Intelligence - Monitor bills affecting your industry
• Journalism - Find newsworthy legislative activity
• Legal Compliance - Track regulatory changes
• Academic Research - Historical congressional data analysis
• Policy Tracking - Monitor specific legislators or committees

Supported Data Types

Data Type	Description	Key Fields
Bills	All legislation (H.R., S., resolutions)	Title, sponsor, status, actions, summary
Amendments	Changes proposed to bills	Purpose, sponsor, status
Members	Senators and Representatives	Party, state, district, committees
Committees	Congressional committees	Chamber, members, jurisdiction
Hearings	Committee hearings	Date, topic, witnesses
Nominations	Presidential nominations	Nominee, position, status
Treaties	International treaties	Topic, status, votes
CRS Reports	Research Service reports	Topic, analysis, recommendations
House Votes	Roll call votes (Beta)	Question, result, member votes
Congressional Record	Official proceedings	Date, volume, debates

Getting Started

1. Get Your Free API Key

1. Go to https://api.congress.gov/sign-up/
2. Fill in your name and email
3. Check your email for the API key (arrives within seconds)

2. Run the Actor

{
    "api_key": "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE",
    "data_type": "bills",
    "congress": 118,
    "search_query": "climate change",
    "max_results": 100,
    "enable_scoring": true
}

Input Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
api_key	string	Yes	Your Congress.gov API key
data_type	string	Yes	Type of data to extract (see list above)
congress	number	No	Filter by Congress number (e.g., 118 for 2023-2025)
bill_type	string	No	Filter by bill type (hr, s, hjres, sjres, etc.)
chamber	string	No	Filter by chamber (house, senate)
state_code	string	No	Filter members by state (e.g., CA, TX)
search_query	string	No	Keywords to search in titles/descriptions
from_date	string	No	Start date (YYYY-MM-DD)
to_date	string	No	End date (YYYY-MM-DD)
include_details	boolean	No	Fetch full bill details (slower)
include_text	boolean	No	Include bill text links
max_results	number	No	Maximum results (default: 100)
enable_scoring	boolean	No	Calculate relevance scores (default: true)

Example Output

Bill Data

{
    "type": "bill",
    "data_source": "congress.gov",
    "bill_type": "HR",
    "number": "1234",
    "congress": 118,
    "title": "Clean Energy Innovation Act",
    "origin_chamber": "House",
    "latest_action": "Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce.",
    "latest_action_date": "2024-03-15",
    "sponsor": {
        "name": "Rep. Smith, John [D-CA-12]",
        "party": "D",
        "state": "CA",
        "bioguide_id": "S001234"
    },
    "cosponsor_count": 45,
    "summary": {
        "text": "This bill promotes clean energy innovation...",
        "action_date": "2024-03-15",
        "action_desc": "Introduced in House"
    },
    "subjects": ["Energy", "Climate Change", "Research"],
    "relevance_score": 85,
    "congress_gov_url": "https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/1234",
    "scraped_at": "2024-03-20T10:30:00Z"
}

Member Data

{
    "type": "member",
    "data_source": "congress.gov",
    "bioguide_id": "P000197",
    "name": "Pelosi, Nancy",
    "party": "Democratic",
    "state": "CA",
    "district": 11,
    "chamber": "House of Representatives",
    "relevance_score": 80,
    "scraped_at": "2024-03-20T10:30:00Z"
}

Advanced Usage

Track Specific Topics

{
    "api_key": "YOUR_KEY",
    "data_type": "bills",
    "congress": 118,
    "search_query": "artificial intelligence",
    "include_details": true,
    "max_results": 50
}

Get All Senators from a State

{
    "api_key": "YOUR_KEY",
    "data_type": "members",
    "state_code": "TX",
    "chamber": "senate"
}

Recent Bills with Full Text

{
    "api_key": "YOUR_KEY",
    "data_type": "bills",
    "congress": 118,
    "from_date": "2024-01-01",
    "include_details": true,
    "include_text": true,
    "max_results": 25
}

Relevance Scoring

Each item receives an AI-calculated relevance score (0-100) based on:

• Recency - Items updated in the last week score higher
• Activity - Bills that became law or passed chambers score higher
• Current Congress - Current congress items score higher
• Status - Active members, pending nominations score higher

Rate Limits

The Congress.gov API has rate limits. This actor automatically:

• Respects rate limits with built-in delays
• Retries on 429 (rate limit) errors
• Paginates large result sets efficiently

Pricing

This actor charges $3 per 1,000 results. You only pay for the data you receive.

• Bills with basic info: $3/1K
• Bills with full details: $5/1K (additional API calls)

Support

• Issues: GitHub Issues
• Questions: Contact via Apify

Changelog

1.0.0 (2024)

• Initial release
• Support for 10 data types
• AI relevance scoring
• Full details mode for bills
• Search and filtering

License

MIT License - Free to use for any purpose.

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Built by benthepythondev | Data from official Congress.gov API