How a rating gets on a card
Same rules for every official. The promise is their words, copied from a page that was opened. The rating is one of six labels. If the words are too vague to test, the card says Not yet rated.
What a card is
A promise card has four parts: the quote, what has happened, a short timeline, and a source link. The quote is copied, not rewritten. A number card is different. It puts a published goal next to a published count. It does not get a Kept or Broken label.
The six ratings
These are the definitions the site uses. They are the same words as the rubric in the code.
Clear action matches the promise — a law passed, a program funded, a vote in the promised direction.
Documented steps are moving: a bill introduced, sponsored, or publicly advancing.
A fair window passed — a full session or a Congress year — with no meaningful action.
Acted opposite to the promise, or abandoned it in public.
Partial delivery that changes the scope, timing, or dollars of the original promise.
Too vague to test, or no source yet. We would rather say that than guess.
How that looks on the current cards
Not yet rated is the default. A sentence such as “I support more housing,” with no bill, dollar amount, or date, stays there.
In Progress means a step is already on a page we opened: a bill introduced, a bill that passed one chamber and is not law, or a committee advance the member’s own release describes. On the Governor’s page, a specific line in the published reelection plan can also be In Progress while the new term’s bills are still ahead. A plan line with no target stays Not yet rated.
Kept, Broken, Compromise, and Stalled are not used unless a page we opened shows that outcome. A law with the same name as an older pledge is described on the card and is not marked Kept until the two texts are compared. A member’s press release is not treated as the roll call.
Sources
The link on a card is a page a reader can open without paying: a campaign site, a .gov page, Congress.gov, or a state report. A paywalled news story can sit beside it, labeled as paywalled. It is not the link you need in order to read the quote. Numbers on a number card come from the agency that publishes them. A permit count is not a count of finished homes, and the card says so.
What does not rate a card
Tips do not. A coffee meter does not. Party does not. A model does not assign the status. The words on this page are the rules, and a person publishes the card. There is no separate score hiding behind the label.
Disputes and corrections
Disputes are public and hold a rating as Under Review until a person resolves them in writing — bots never close disputes. No rating ever changes silently: every change lands in a public change log with a date and a reason. Corrections are published on the same page they fix. Bots collect and match; published rules rate; humans review.
One limit, stated here so the rule is not bigger than the site: this site has no database, so it cannot store a dispute or flip a card to Under Review by itself. The dispute box on an official’s page is a note you can copy. It is not sent. A separate change-log page is not built. When a card changes, the correction is the card itself: the quote, the status, and the source.