# Federal Awards: cited contract spending by agency, recipient (`citature/federal-awards`) Actor

Cited federal contract-award totals for a fiscal year, ranked by awarding agency, place-of-performance state, or recipient (by UEI). Every answer carries a receipt: the exact source URL, when it was retrieved, coverage caveats, match provenance, and guardrails.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/citature/federal-awards.md
- **Developed by:** [citature](https://apify.com/citature) (community)
- **Categories:** AI
- **Stats:** 1 total users, 0 monthly users, 96.2% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

$20.00 / 1,000 answer serveds

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/platform/actors/running/actors-in-store#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.

- **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use).
- **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`.
- **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`.
- **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`.
- **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).

For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.

For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).

# README

## Federal Awards — cited contract spending

Federal contract-award dollars for a U.S. fiscal year, ranked **by awarding
agency**, **by place-of-performance state**, or **by recipient**, returned with a
full citation receipt. Built for AI agents and analysts who need a spending number
they can defend, with the exact public source attached.

Data comes straight from **USASpending.gov** — the primary, public-domain federal
record of contract awards. No aggregator, no scoring, no editorializing.

### What you can ask

- Which **agencies** obligated the most contract dollars in fiscal year **2024**?
- Which **states** received the most federal award spending by place of
  performance?
- Which **recipients** (companies, universities, nonprofits — identified by their
  federal UEI) were awarded the most?

Keywords: federal spending, government contracts, USAspending, contract awards,
procurement, agency budgets, government contractors, award recipients, UEI,
federal grants and contracts, public spending, defense spending, GovCon.

### Input

| Field | Type | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| `fiscal_year` | integer | yes | U.S. fiscal year, e.g. `2024`. |
| `group_by` | `"agency"` | `"state"` | `"recipient"` | no (default `agency`) | How to rank. |
| `limit` | integer 1–500 | no (default 50) | Max ranked rows. |

```json
{ "fiscal_year": 2024, "group_by": "agency", "limit": 5 }
```

### Output — an answer with a receipt

The actor returns one receipt object (also stored as the run's `OUTPUT`). The
`answer` is the ranked totals; `matches` declares any cross-source join the answer
relied on, and `citations` is the exact source you can re-run yourself.

```json
{
  "answer": [
    {
      "fiscal_year": 2024,
      "agency_entity_id": "agcy_5f3b…",
      "agency_name": "Department of Defense",
      "total_cents": 41880000000000,
      "award_count": 128342
    }
  ],
  "citations": [
    {
      "source": "usaspending",
      "source_label": "USAspending.gov",
      "query_url": "https://api.usaspending.gov/api/v2/search/spending_by_award/?page=1",
      "retrieved_at": "2026-01-02T00:00:00.000Z",
      "as_of": null,
      "cache": "cached",
      "record_id": null
    }
  ],
  "coverage": [
    "Coverage reflects records currently in citature's dataset, not the full upstream history.",
    "An award's fiscal year is derived from its action/start date."
  ],
  "guardrails": [
    "Research over public-domain federal records — not legal, financial, or eligibility advice.",
    "citature reports what the record says. It never renders a compliance verdict, a screening pass/fail, or a recommendation.",
    "Entity-level records only (committees, candidates, recipients, agencies, contracts). No individual-person data."
  ],
  "matches": [
    {
      "match_method": "exact",
      "match_confidence": 1,
      "left_key": "usaspending.awarding_agency",
      "right_key": "citature.entity_agency.agency_name",
      "note": "agency resolved to a citature entity on the toptier awarding-agency name"
    }
  ],
  "schema_version": "0.1.0"
}
```

Money is always integer **cents** (`total_cents`). Ranking by recipient joins on
the **UEI**, the universal federal awardee key; ranking by state uses a native
award field and declares no join.

### Guardrails

- Research over public-domain federal records — **not** legal, financial, or
  eligibility advice.
- citature reports what the record says. It never renders a compliance verdict, a
  screening pass/fail, or a recommendation.
- Entity-level records only. No individual-person data is ever returned.

### Pricing

Pay per successful answer. You are charged only when an answer is served; a
rejected or failed request is never billed.

# Actor input Schema

## `fiscal_year` (type: `integer`):

U.S. federal fiscal year, e.g. 2024. An award's fiscal year is derived from its action/start date.

## `group_by` (type: `string`):

Rank award dollars by the awarding agency, the place-of-performance state, or the recipient (keyed on UEI).

## `limit` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of ranked rows to return (1 to 500).

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "fiscal_year": 2024,
  "group_by": "agency",
  "limit": 50
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `receipts` (type: `string`):

No description

## `receipt` (type: `string`):

No description

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "fiscal_year": 2024
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("citature/federal-awards").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = { "fiscal_year": 2024 }

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("citature/federal-awards").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print("💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/" + run["defaultDatasetId"])
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "fiscal_year": 2024
}' |
apify call citature/federal-awards --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": [
                "mcp-remote",
                "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=citature/federal-awards",
                "--header",
                "Authorization: Bearer <YOUR_API_TOKEN>"
            ]
        }
    }
}

```

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/9d10yPfiSGnMg4n26/builds/WnIRB0NQEVphoT17O/openapi.json